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The 

Christmas  Motto, 

and  the 

Old  Prophetic  Presages  of  a  Coming 
Golden  Era  of  Peace 


an  flnqutri^ 

BY 

ISAAC  SCHWAB,  Ph.  D., 

Author  of  '  The  Sabbath  in  History,'  Etc. 


St.  Joseph,  Mo.: 
Press  of  Combe  Printing  Company. 


Copyrighted  December,  1S97, 
By  the  Author. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

Discussion  of  the  origin  and  primitive  meaning  of  tlie 
Christmas  Motto,  "  Peace  on  earth,  good-will  among 
men,"  and  the  author's  own  view  on  this  point 1 

CHAPTER   11. 

Extension  of  the  argument  of  chapter  1 24 

CHAPTER  III. 

An  effort  to  set  right  the  faimous  prop^hetic  visions, 
passing  as  predictive  of  a  glorious,  golden  (Mes- 
sianic) era  'of  abiding  peace,  Tby  an  independent 
examination,  with  new  light  thrown  upon  different 
questions  of  this  subject  Tby  the  aid  of  advanced 
theological  science 33 

NOTES. 

1-40 65-121 

EXCURSUS. 

Treating  critically  of  the  prophetic  enthusiasm  about 
a  blessed  Messianic  future,  by  illus'trations  from 
modern  Assyriology,  and  partly  with  reference  to 
Virgil 122 


PREFACE. 


My  aim  in  tlie  present  Avork  is  to  set  in  the  liglit  of 
critical  inquiry  the  famous  Christmas  legiend,  "Peace  on 
Earth,  Good-will  lamong  Men,"  -with  the  other  half  of 
the  subject,  as  presented  in  the  title,  "The  Old 
Prophetic  Presiages  of  a  coming  Grolden  Era  of  Peace." 
This  legend  carries  an  overwhelming  significance  to 
human  society.  In  theory  it  is  inestimable.  But  as 
yet  it  is  a  theory  only;  charming,  captivating,  effective 
in  sense  and  exprtession,  but  yet  a  theory,  wiaiting  to  be 
put  into  action.  The  same  is  the  case  with  those  pro- 
phetic forecasts  of  a  glorious  future  of  peace.  They 
have  thus  far  remained  unfulfilled.  They  shared  in  the 
fate  of  all  exalted  and  surpassing  expectations  for  the 
future,  wdiich  shine  as  castles  with  brigh'test  hues  along 
the  horizon,  but  defy  the  human  grasp.  And  the  nearer 
to  them  people  at  times  believe  that  they  are,  the  farther 
they  will  in  sober  and  thoughtful  hours  really  find  them- 
selves to  be.  The  happy  and  magnificent  goal  prognosr 
ticated  in  those  olden  prophets  was  never  reached, 
however  lanxiously  the  friends  of  peace  and  kindly 
humanitarians  were  pining  for  it.  Their  ardent  hope 
would  never  bring  them  nearer  to  it,  nor  bring  it  nearer 
to  them.  Were  they  thus  disappointed?  Certainly  they 
must  have  been.  But  the  repeated  failure  of  theoir  fond 
outlook  did  not  weary  and  dispirit  them  enough  to  give 
it  up  in  'despair.  This  is,  too,  quite  in  the  nature  of 
hope.  "It  builds,"  as  Pope  says,  "as  fast  as  knowledge 
can  destroy."  Or,  as  Browning  renders  the  thought: 
"All  men  hope,  and  see  their  hopes  frustrate,  and  gi'ieve 
awhile,    and   hope   again."     No    disappointment   could 


VI 


Preface. 


ever  throw  the  firm  Jewish  Messiah-believers  or 
Christian  Millenarians  oil  tJheir  trade  of  hope,  though 
they  were  disillusioned  a  thousand  times. 

As  to  the  evangelical  theory,  "peace  on  earth,"  which 
has  never  yet  been  verified,  it  can  surely  not  be  said 
that  this  was  due  to  the  fault  of  its  tenor.  The  trouble 
lies  elsewhere.  It  is  the  nations  of  the  world  that  set 
themselves  against  it  and  hinder  its  realization.  They 
ever  were  and  still  are  loth  to  incorporate  it  into  their 
rules  of  conduct  and  mutual  relations.  They  even 
refuse  to  be  guided  by  one  of  the  leading  doctrines  of 
the  jSTew  Testament,  which  has  equally  with  that 
theory  been  standing  out  clearly  and  distinctly  enough 
these  nineteen  centuries  past — ^the  condemnation  of  war- 
fare on  the  ground  of  the  great  virtues  of  forbearance 
and  non-resistance.  Strauss,  in  "The  Old  and  the  ]^ew 
Faith,"  relates  that  Renan  had  written  him  during  the 
late  Franco-GeiTnan  war:  "JSTeither  in  the  Beatitudes 
nor  any^vhere  else  in  the  gospel  there  is  found  one 
word  promising  Heaven  for  tbe  possession  or  exhibition 
of  martial  virtues."  This  was  undoubtedly  a  sort  of 
sarcastic  protest  against  the  bloody  war  in  which  that 
great  savant's  nation  was  then  involved.  Who  will 
deny  that  this  protest  was  correct  and  well  applied? 

Formally,  indeed,  the  nations  accept  that  leading 
Christian  doctrine.  So  do  they  avow  the  bdauty  and 
grandeur  of  the  Christmas  theory.  But  practically  they 
do  not  heed  the  great  lesson  these  excellent  precepts 
teach.  Tliey  have  not  the  will  determining  them  to  carry 
this  teaching  into  effect  in  their  political  interrelatious. 
A  further  impediment  to  such  accomplishment,  even  if 
all  nations  would  consent  in  principle — as  the  more 
advanced  ones  really  seem  to  do — ^would  be  the 
troublesome  question.  Who  will  make  the  first  step  and 
establisih  the  precedent  for  such  pacific  course?  It  is 
evidently  the  solid  concert  of  the  nations  in  regard  to  t!he 
great  end  of  universal  peace  and,  in  especial,  an  adequ'ate 


Preface.  vii 

awe-sti-iking  aiit'liority  to  guard  >tliis  concert  effectuallj 
from  any  wanton  breiadi,  that  are  sadly  wanting.  Pos- 
sibly, too,  sucih  concert  and  efficient  autliority  will  never 
be  attained. 

It  is  no  less  notable  a  jurist  tlian  the  eminent  lord 
chief  justice  of  England,  Lord  Kussell,  who,  in  an 
address  delivered  last  year  at  Saratoga,  rested  his 
diffidence  against  the  creation  of  a  tribunal  of  interna- 
tional arbitration  on  that  very  ground. 

"While  he  strongly  champions  the  idea  of  such  arbi- 
tration, he  yet  urges  this  want  as  seriously  hindering  the 
cause  of  universal  peace.  In  view  of  this  circumstance, 
and  also  the  point  marked  by  him,  that  "most  of  the 
nations  are  armed,"  he  is  of  opinion  that  a  more  sure 
advancement  of  this  cause  than  might  be  looked  for 
from  any  legal  institution  of  arbitration,  is  to  be 
expected*^  from  these  more  natural  influences:  the 
steadily  growing  and  spreading  public  opinion  with  its 
condemnation  of  warfare  and  peaceful  predilections,  the 
ever  increasing  moral  and  intellectual  culture  of  man- 
kind, and  in  particular  the  pacifying  factors  of  com- 
merce, trade  and  travel  between  nations. 

Assuredly,  this  view  of  the  great  English  jurist, 
which  we  may,  moreover,  hold  as  largely  representative 
of  English  sentiment  at  home,  is  not  encouraging  for  the 
prospect  of  an  authoritative  and,  thus,  efficient  tribunal 
of  international  arbitration  being  brought  forth  in  the 
near  future.  However  the  people  in  general  may  favor 
it,  it  is  their  leaders  and  beads  who,  from  a  martial  tem- 
per or  selfish  and  sinister  motives,  take  either  an  an- 
tagonistic or  at  least  a  dilatory  stand  in  regard  to  the 
question.  Too  sanguine  a  hope  may  even  not  be  advis- 
able for  us  as  to  the  point  of  arbitration  yet  at  issue 
between  the  two  great  English  speaking  nations  of  the 
world.  And  concerning  the  other  members  of  the 
family  of  nations,  well — their  standing  amiies  are  a 
standing  menace  to  the  peace  and  well-being  of  human 


viii  Preface. 

society,  so  that  at  present  little  relief  can  be  expected 
from  a  standing  court  of  international  arbitration,  were 
it  even  that  its  creation  was  easy  of  acco-mplishment. 

Nor,  we  have  to  fear,  will  all  the  peace  leagues  or 
congresses  that  may  be  held  in  the  present  days  or  in 
all  future,  help  forward  the  cause  of  international  arbi- 
tration and  peace  to  any  considerable  extent.  All  such 
theoretical  agencies  will  have  little  effect  upon  the 
absolutely  warlike  nations  of  the  world.  These  will 
simply  spurn  or  ridicule  the  idea  of  such  theoretical 
bodies  attempting  to  meddle  in  their  own  'blood  and 
iron'  affairs.  Highly  praiseworthy  as  the  well-meaning 
efforts  of  these  associations  truly  are,  their  efficiency  for 
practical  good  in  a  universal  respect  is  surely  question- 
able. 

It  is  here  in  point  to-  cite  once  more  the  above-noted 
writer,  Strauss.  Refemng  ironically  tO'  thei  notorious 
peace  congTess  held  in  Lausanne,  in  September,  1871, 
he  observes:  "The  famous  orators,  both  male  and 
female,  who  aired  their  sentiments  at  that  gathering, 
should  be  reminded  of  Horace's  suggestion,  that  the 
fashioner  of  men,  Prometheus,  mixed  up  the  substance 
of  the  human  heart  with  a  portion  of  the  fury  of  the 
grim  lion."  Then,  taking  up  the  point  of  modem 
evolution,  he  argues:  "This  scientific  notion  alone 
should  have  led  those  orators  to  the  same  conclusion. 
For,  if  man  reially  descends  aboriginally  from  the 
animal  kingdom,  he  is  i^rimarily  an  irrational  being. 
Accordingly,  nature,  cupidity  and  angry  passion  will, 
despite  the  progress  of  reason  and  science,  reitain  great 
power  over  him." 

Now  that  fable  of  the  lionly  admixture  of  the  human 
heart  need  certainly  not  give  us  any  concern.  Dif- 
ferent it  is  with  tliat  scientific  problem  of  evolution. 
It  certainly  must  set  us  pondering,  and  just  in  the  direc- 
tion poiiuted  out  by  that  unrelenting  German  critic.  It 
cannot  be  denied  that  evolution  opens  a  rather  melan- 


Preface,  ix 

oliolj  view  of  the  outlook  for  universal  peace.  It 
inevitably  suggesits  the  thought  th'at  the  gi^acious 
Christmas  theory  will,  until  a  much  "farther  off"  time, 
have  to  content  itself  \vith  being  a  pious  wish,  a  poetical 
longing.  Tliis  time,  too,  mil  consistently  have  to  be 
taken  as  coextensive  with  tilie  indefinite  and  problematic 
period  when  humanity  will  have  "thrown  off  the  brute 
inheritance,"  which  dates  from  the  primitive,  pre- 
social  state  of  mankind  with  its  peculiar  military  charac- 
ter. Whether  or  no  the  evolutionary  conclusion  can  be 
verified,  that  "rivalry  and  conflict  is  the  law  of  life," 
this  much  seems  open  to  no  doubt,  tlhait  there  is  yet  too 
much  of  the  "ape  and  tiger,"  or,  to  speak  with  Horace, 
of  the  lion,  in  main's  constitution,  tO'  let  us  expect  a 
great  deal  from  the  modern  expedient  of  a  universal 
tribunal  ()f  arbitration. 

"Man  is  not  yet  finished."  Until  he  be  finished, 
we  may  look  in  vain  for  the  accomplishment  of 
the  old  Hebrew  oracle,  that  the  time  will  come 
when  war  will  be  annihilated,  and  the  nations 
will  put  away  their  tools  of  feud,  vengeance  or  conquest 
and  turn  them  into  agricultural  utensils.  Until  then, 
also,  it  will  be  illusory  to  expect  a  realization  of  the 
grand  Christmas  theory.  It  is  readily  seeai  and  will  as 
readily  be  conceded  by  all,  that  present  and  immediately 
prospective  conditions  jar  yet  too  much  with  its  sweet 
notes.  Blessings  of  peace  cannot  be  insured  to  mankind 
until  the  curse  of  war  in  the  world  be  rooted  out.  That 
it  is  a  curse,  an  unmitigated  evil,  despite  siome  tempor- 
arily enjoyable  inflation  and  a  certain  degree  of  progress 
in  the  sphere  of  human  intelligence,  no  true  mian  and 
well-wisher  of  society  will  dispute.  Warfare  is  by  all 
means  a  barbarous  use,  a  relic  of  barbarity,  which  we 
otherwise  so  boastfully  claim  to  have  shaken  off,  and  its 
cost,  in  every  sense  of  the  word,  is  incompensable. 
Until  that  happy  eveilt  of  evolution,  when  "man  will  be 
finished,"  there  will  indeed  always  be  seasons  of  peace, 


X  Preface. 

jet  its  abiding  golden  age  will  not  arrive  till  "men- 
murdering  Ares"  will  be  utterly  put  down  and  replaced 
by  I&aiali's  "prince  of  peace"  (Isa.  IX.  5) — in  the 
transfigured  sense  of  princely  peace.  Until  then,  too, 
there  will  also  be  breatihingnspaces  in  the  lives  of 
nations,  in  which  old  sunny  dreams  of  universal  peace  to 
come  will  be  resmscitated  with  keen  delight,  and  even 
lovely  buds  of  springing  peace  appear  to  burst  into 
bright  and  fragrant  flowers.  But  soon  enough  tliey  will 
prove  themselves  only  feeble  half -blossoms,  doomed  to 
ruin  by  new  chilling  blasts  of  cruel  ihuman  temper  passr 
ing  over  them,  or  scorched  to  death  by  the  heat  of 
warlike  passion. 

And  yet  must  we  not  despond.  On  the  contrary, 
we  will  indulge  the  hope  tlmt  better  days  are  in  store 
for  mankind,  when  within  the  realm  of  civilization  the 
"fury  goddess"  will  no  more  be  permitted  to  be 
unchained  and  "  march  through  prosperous  lands,  bear- 
ing terror  and  disaster  in  her  course,"  but  forced  to  be 
sitting  forever  upon  the  fierce  arms,  bound  fast  mth 
brazen  chains  (see  page  139  of  the  present  treatise).  We 
Avill  confidently  look  forward  to  the'  happy  tune,  however 
far  off,  in  which  fierce,  cruel  w^ar  will  not  be  waged  any 
more  between  members  of  the  family  of  nations,  but  be 
held  in  abhorrenoe  under  the  universally  accepted 
sanction  that  it  is  "murderous  to  islay  a  brother  man," 
in  Avar  no  less  than  in  peace;  and  when  even  crowned 
heads  mil  no  more  be  tempted,  in  their  intoxication  of 
power,  to  meiasure  physical  force's  with  other  potentates, 
but  will  themselves  shrink  back  with  horror  from  bloody 
conflict  as  an  unatonable  crime. 

It  is  noit  wise  to  offer  a  presage  of  the  future. 
To  gaze  into  its  mazes  with  cle^ar  perception  and 
desciry  what  lies  hidden  in  it,  is  given  to  no 
man.  'But  at  leiast  an  encouraging  glance  of  what  is 
ahead  of  mankind,  we  may  catch  by  the  way  of  reason- 
able inference   from   the  present  aspect  of  things  in 


Preface.  xi 

civilized  .human  society.  There  is,  we  hold,  strongest 
ground  for  the  belief  thait  moral  and  intellectual  culture 
alike  will  henceforth  advance  steadily,  and  meet  no 
more  relapses  into  barbarity  or  half-barbarity,  as  was 
the  case  in  the  march  of  previous  civilizations.  There 
seems  no  possibility  of  suoh  relapse  in  this  our  eleictrical 
age  or  henceforth.  The  present  high  development  of 
culture  and  refinement  of  feeling  must  inspire  us 
with  confidence  that  its  moral  basis  will  never  be 
shaken  more  within  the  civilized  world.  We  may  further 
take  heart  for  the  uninterrupted  progress  of  the  high  and 
blessed  cause  of  peace,  from  the  present  movement  for 
international  arbitration.  jSTever  before  were  tiie  intel- 
ligent classes  of  society  so  zealously  intent  on  avoiding 
bloody  contests  as  they  are  now.  Never  before  was  the 
question  of  international  arbitration  discussed  with  suoh 
native  fervor  and  pure  enthusiasm  as  in  our  day.  The 
Venezuelan  dispute,  more  than  any  other  previous 
American  complication,  has  opened  the  eyes  of  the 
public  to  the  necessity  of  allaying  mutual  national 
difiiculties  not  at  the  voracious  mouth  of  the  cannon, 
but  by  the  venerable,  ancient  canon  of  "and  thou  shalt 
love  they  neighbor  as  thyself"  (Leviticus  XIX.  18). 
This  sacred  maxim,  they  feel,  is  and  ought  to  be  powerful 
enough  to  induce  dissenting  nations  to  meet  and  compose 
their  differences  by  peaceful  means  and  ways,  and  fair 
and  lawful  arrangement.  Since  then  the  question  of 
interaational  arbitration  has  not  subsided  in  \dgor  or 
lost  in  interest.  On  the  contrary,  it  has  gTown  and 
expanded  more  and  more.  The  principle  of  such  arbi- 
ration  has  found  its  noble  embodiment  in  an  existing 
treaty  between  England  and  America.  All  hail  to  the 
wise  and  patriotic  diplomats  who  brought  it  about! 

From  this  narrower  compass  of  the  great  question 
we  may  enlarge  our  vista,  and  fairly  regard  it  as  the 
auspicious  harbinger  of  that  more  general,  even  univer- 
sal improvement  of  the  times,  when  the  law  of  love  will 


^^^  Preface. 

practically  be  infused  into  the  so-oalled  law  of  nations, 
and  tlieee  will  of  tbeir  own  accord  abolish  perni- 
cious warfare,  and  uniformly  pursue  a  policy  of 
peace  and  agreement,  or  amicable  adjustment  in 
threatening  tensions  'of  national  feeling.  Towards  the 
attainment  of  this  glorious,  golden  end  all  of  us,  individ- 
ually and  imitedly,  must  work  with  our  best  powers. 

Let,  then,  no  melancholy  misgiving  disturb  our 
hopeful  sentiment,  but  Idt  us  trust  that  humianity  will 
henceforth  and  forever  "move  upward,  working  out  the 
beast  and  letting  the  ape  and  tiger  die;"  and  that  all 
fierce  rivalry  will  more  and  more  decrease  within  civil- 
ized society,  and  only  peaceful  competition  prevail,  the 
password  being  no  more,  strive  to  hurt  and  wound,  but 
"strive  and  thrive." 

The  present  treatise  deals  with  the  problem  of  peace 
in  human  society,  in  connection  with  pertinent  sacred 
texts.  May  it  meet  with  many  congenial  readers  ready 
to  accord  it  a  generous  appreciation.  It  has  been 
written  in  the  spirit  of  fairness,  and  in  the  service  of 
pure  science  merely.  Dogmatic  bias  or  prejudice  never 
entered  deliberately  into  its  fabric.  In  return  it  expects 
from  the  public  the  same  spirit  of  fairness  in  receiving 
and  judging  upon  it.  Looking  forward  to  the  good-will 
of  the  public,  I  now  send  it  forth,  commissioned  to  per^ 
form  its  task  of  helping  to  clear  up  important  questions 
ever  of  interest  to  earnest  Jewish  and  Christian  minds 
alike. 

THE  AUTHOR 


CHAPTER    L 


"Eing  out,  ye  crystal  spheres! 
Once  bless  our  human  ears. 

If  ye  have  power  to  touch  our  senses  so;  .  .  . 

For,  if  such  holy  song 
Enwrap  our  fancy  long. 

Time  will  run  back,  and  fetch  the  age  of  gold;  .  .  . 

Yea,  Truth  and  Justice  then 
Will  down  return  to  men, 
Orb'd  In  a  rainbow;"  .  .  . 

(Milton,  'Ode  on  the  Nativity.') 

The  beautiful  Christmas  legend,  "Peace  on  earth, 
good-"\vill  among  men,"  taken  from  Luke,  chapter  11.14:, 
may  fitly  be  compared  to  the  glittering  crest  of  a  wave. 
It  is  delic'litful  and  fascinating  to  view,  but  when  it 
subsides  again  into  its  even  run  it  will  necessarily 
partake  of  the  nature  of  the  pallid  or  turbid  body  of 
water  from  which  it  has  risen.  The  same  may  be  said 
of  that  sentence  which  popular  thought  and  parlance 
have  seized  upon  and  appropriated  as  practically  con- 
veying the  lesson  of  good-fellowship  and  charity  for 
and  on  the  acce^Dted  day  of  the  ISTativity.  The  sentence 
is  indeed  in  its  superficial  aspect  brimful  of  brightness 
and  cheer.  It  carries  a  momentum  of  sweetness  and 
grace.  But  when  we  examine  it  in  its  proper  place 
and  logical  context,  it  appears  at  once  as  something 
different  from  what  it  is  currently  held  to  be — a  well- 


2  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

rounded  Christmas  lesson.  While  it  will  even  then  not 
lose  its  exquisite  beauty  inherent  in  its  abstract  percep- 
tion, it  can  yet  no  longer  appeal  to  the  sentiment  with 
the  rapture  of  a  splendid  phenomenon,  or  be  held 
reducible  to  a  maxim  incorporated  by  the  evangelist 
with  the  intention  of  instruction  or  admonition.  As 
such,  however,  it  passes  with  the  unreflecting  and 
uninquiring  mind.  It  readily  assigns  the  first  clause 
to  the  doxology  proper,  and  is  content  to  take  the  rest 
as  a  call  to  mutual  "peace  and  good-will,"  which  the 
festive  recollection  of  the  I^ativity  is  presumed  to 
awaken  on  the  annual  day  of  its  celebration.  But  upon 
thoughtful  reading  and  search  the  relative  text  of  the 
Christmas  sentence  as  it  occurs  in  the  gospel,  far  from 
being  a  clear,  sunny  saying,  proves  to  be  one  of  the  most 
obscure  passages  of  the  ISTew  Testament  writings. 

As  regards  its  direct  and  only  purport  in  the  gospel, 
it  is  a  representation  of  an  angelic  song  alleged  to  have 
been  intonated  in  the  night  of  the  birth  of  Jesus  in  the 
presence  of  some  Jewish  shepherds  near  Bethlehem. 
The  song  is  one  of  praise  to  God  from  the  beginning 
of  the  verse  to  its  end.  All  its  parts  are  organically 
coherent  and  bear  exclusively  on  the  historical  point  of 
the  ISTativity,  as  which  alone  Luke  can  be  supposed  to 
have  embodied  it  in  his  gospel.  And  his  only  purpose 
can  have  been  to  produce  an  angelic  testification  and 
at  the  same  time  glorification  of  the  new-born  Jesus 
as  the  Messiah  and  Savior.  This  is  indeed,  for  all  we 
know,  in  substance  the  concurrent  opinion  of  all  the 
theological  expositors  who  ever  set  themselves  to  deal 
with  the  refractorv  Greek  text  of  our  sentence  which, 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.         3 

moreover,  has  been  delivered  to  us  in  essentially 
divergent  readings. 

That  consequently,  let  us  say,  a  decided  difference 
exists  between  the  learned  expositors  in  the  construction 
of  the  sentence,  is  very  natural.  We  cannot  go  into 
an  extensive  survey  of  the  expository  opinions  that  text 
has  called  forth  in  the  past.  It  ever  proved  a  real 
'crux'  for  the  interpreters,  and  offered  a  wide  battle- 
ground for  the  display  of  exegeitical  contention.  We 
propose  anon  to  present  our  own  conjecture  which,  we 
trust,  will  not  unprofitably  swell  the  already  existing 
large  fund  of  speculation  on  the  content  of  the  doxology. 

Preliminarily  we  feel  tempted  to  say  that  we  ought, 
on  the  whole,  not  to  go  with  it  into  too  stern  a  critical 
judgment.  We  should  bear  in  mind — what  we  declare 
as  so  very  important  foir  the  right  estimate  of  texts  of 
the  kind — >that  it  belongs  on  the  one  hand  to  the  age 
of  miracles  and,  on  the  other,  to  the  age  of  uncritical 
use  of  and  illogical  reference  to  Hebrew  Scripture 
passages. 

The  stupendous  apparition  and  proclamation  of 
angels  would,  truly,  as  the  reported  fact  of  Luke's 
gospel,  offer  no  difficulty  whatever  to  its  writer  or  the 
simple-minded  shepherds  who  are  in  it  quoted  as  sole 
witnesses  to  that  marvelous  incident.  Yet  the  sober 
thought  of  our  scientific  and  reasoning  age  can  meet  it 
at  best  but  wdth  a  reverent  skepticism,  and  will  conse- 
quently have  to  forbear  treating  it  with  the  earnestness 
it  is  wont  to  bring  to  points  of  inquiry,  verifiable  or  to 
be  made  probable  at  least  by  some  sort  of  evidence. 

Even  in  regard  to  the  wording  of  Luke's  doxology. 


4  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

which,  is  withal  to  be  set  down  as  having  been  drawn  in 
some  manner  from  Hebrew  Scriptural  patterns,  our 
temper  of  investigation  ought  to  be  mild  and  indulgent. 
That  the  various  writers  of  the  ISTew  Testament  were  by 
no  means  particular  with  the  form  in  which  they 
reproduced  old  Scripture  texts,  can  be  proved  by 
numerous  instances.  All  they  were  concerned  with 
was,  to  give  authority  and  prestige  to  their  owa  asser- 
tions or  accounts  by  means  of  some  accommodation  to 
anterior  accredited  Scripture.  However  slight  and 
insignificant  this  accommodation  would  appear  to  our 
modern  analytical  temper  and  judgment,  it  was  to  them 
all-sufficient  for  their  present  purpose,  even  for  the 
general  requirements  of  their  time  as  well.  And  if  the 
transmitted  text  would  in  its  actual  phraseology  yield 
no  support  to  their  arguments  or  representations,  they 
hesitated  not  to  take  the  license  of  altering  it  to  suit 
themselves.  In  this  respect  they  went  even  far  beyond 
the  Rabbinic  scholastics  of  those  centuries,  who  would 
shrink  with  terror  from  the  thought  of  practically 
altering  any  portion  or  relation  of  extant  Scripture, 
even  for  the  most  pressing  or  most  holy  argiimentative 
object.  All  they  did  whenever  they  wished  to  urge  an 
important  or  curiously  wise  point  was,  to  suggest 
hypothetically,  and  merely  for  argument's  sake,  "do  not 
read  (as  it  stands),  but  (as  proposed  instead)."  A 
more  common  practice  Avith  them  was  to  lean  a  prop- 
osition freshly  brought  out,  against  a  few  words  or  only 
one  word  of  a  Scriptural  clause,  however  alien  to  their 
argument  the  literal  and  internal  import  of  their 
quotation  was. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.         5 

In  the  'New  Testament  writings  we  are  multifa- 
riously confronted  with  Hebrew  Scripture  references 
which  the  authors  thought  fit  to  change,  in  the  one  way 
or  the  other,  for  the  particular  object  they  then 
mentally  pursued  and  for  which  they  sought  authentic 
confirmation.  Akin  to  this  mode  of  proceeding  there 
was  another,  which  we  wish  to  point  out  in  support  of 
our  foregoing  observation,  that  we  ought  not  to  apply  a 
strict  standard  of  criticism  to  Luke's  doxology,  as  it  is 
of  a  kind  which  does  practically  not  bear  it.  We  mean 
the  formation  of  a  sort  of  new  texts  from  single  stray 
passages  of  Hebrew  Scripture,  if  no  old  one  was  ready 
to  hand  or  could  prove  available  to  cover  the  point  the 
respective  writer  would  happen  to  urge. 

We  will  in  a  separate  note^^^  illustrate  this  novel 
mode  by  some  striking  instances,  and  those  of  a  character 
intimate  with  the  Christmas  sentence  under  discussion. 
Here  we  will  state  provisionally  that  we  take  this  very 
sentence  also  as  such  an  accidental  new  formation, 
gleaned  from  Hebrew  Scripture  passages  that  floated 
before  the  writer's  mind,  and  then  cemented  together 
for  the  particular  use  of  his  narrative.  How  it  may 
have  come  about  in  the  mind  and  from  the  pen  of  Luke, 
(or  the  original  writer  from  whom  he  drew)  will  later 
be  presented.  To  judge  of  it  thus  leniently,  instead  of 
submitting  it  to  a  sharp  exegetical  scrutiny,  we  would 
candidly  advise  as  the  manner  of  treatment  best  adapted 
for  it.  This  manner  we  must  at  all  events  declare 
preferable  to  the  Sisyphus  labor  of  coercing  the  text  into 
unusual  indications,  to  meet  the  various  requirements  of 
grammar  and  dogma  combined. 


6  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Decidedly  preferable  it  must  be  pronounoed  to  the 
mode  so  general  witliin  conservative  Protestant  tlieology, 
to  let  tlie  angels  have  forestalled  the  Pauline  doctrine  of 
Atonement  or  reconcilation  of  men  to  God  through  the 
death  and  blood  of  Christ.  At  this  rather  prevalent 
interpretation  we  now  want  to  take  a  glance.  We  ^vill 
first  bring  forward  the  exposition  of  Alford,  the  erudite 
English  divine,  whose  Greek  Testament  edition  enjoys 
an  authoritative  influence  with  the  generality  of  our 
theologians.  "We  have  before  us  his  sixth  edition  of  the 
Testament.  He  divides,  Avith  many  moderns,  ^^^  the 
doxology  into  two  clauses  only,  having  adopted — since 
1862,  as  he  states  in  a  note — the  reading  "eudokias,"  in 
the  genitive.  The  "only  admissible  rendering"  of  the 
last  words  of  the  sentence  is  to  him:  "Among  men  of 
God's  good  pleasure."  This  good  pleasure  is  however 
not  to  be  understood  as  that  which  God  has  in  men  as 
such,  but  as  that  which  he  had  "in  Christ,  by  which  he 
reconciles  the  world  to  himself  in  him  (2  Cor.  V.19)," 
The  men  of  "good  pleasure"  are  in  other  words,  and 
those  literally  used  by  Alford  himself,  the  "elect  people 
of  God."  It  is,  then,  not  Israel  as  a  body  and  a  nation 
who  were  by  the  angels  held  in  view  as  the  beneficiaries 
of  the  ISTativity,  in  so  far  that  ^peace'  (or  reconciliation) 
between  them  and  God  would  fall  to  their  lot  through 
Christ.  1^0,  the  angels  particularized  in  favor  of  the 
elect.  And  who  are  those  elect?  Obviously  not  even 
the  generality  of  the  future  believers  in  Jesus' 
Messiahdom  as  such,  as  understood  in  Matt.  XXIV.  22, 
but  those  predestined  for  salvation  before  the  foundation 
of  the  world,  in  accordance  with  Paul's  fatalistic  position 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.         7 

set  forth  in  Eph.  I.  (cp.  Rom.  IX.)  The  upshot  of 
Alford's  intei-pretation  inevitably  is,  that  Luke  made 
the  angels  from  the  outset  discriminate  deliberately, 
though  only  by  implication,  for  the  benefit  of  those  who 
would  eventually  believe  in  the  atoning  merits  of  the 
death  of  the  then  new-born  Jesus,  that  is  to  say,  the  elect. 
But,  let  us  ask,  is  such  studied  and  rigid  dogmatic 
discrimination  compatible  with  the  bright  and  pompous 
pronunciamento,  as  which  Luke's  doxology  must  strike 
every  unbiased  reader?  Further,  it  must  be  objected, 
what  imaginable  good  could  it  have  done  to  the 
understanding  of  the  shepherds  to  hear  a  heavenly  host 
speak  mysteriously  in  a  language  foretokening  Paul',"? 
dogmatic  teaching?  They  were  undoubtedly  with  all 
the  rest  of  their  orthodox  countrymen  hopefully  looking- 
for  a  Messiah  as  the  successful  Redeemer  from  the  yoke 
of  foreign  oppression.  But  we  must  emphatically 
dispute  their  capacity  for  making  out  the  angel's 
supposable  enigmatic  allusion  to  Paul's  later  dogma. 
Their  uninitiated  minds  could  but  have  been  puzzled 
by  it,  and  even  become  worse  confounded,  if  the  point 
of  election  should  additionally  have  been  implied  in  the 
angelic  proclamation.  Xo,  we  protest,  this  construction 
of  the  angels  having  forestalled  in  their  song  Paul's 
twofold  dogmatism  of  Atonement  and  election,  has  no 
reasonable  foundation  in  the  text.  ISTot  even  the  bare 
reference  to  the  Atonement,  without  the  sharp  edge  of 
predestined  election,  can  be  fitly  imputed  to  the  angels' 
song,  for  even  that  would  imply  a  limitation  to  those  who 
would  eventually  have  unquestioning  faith  in  the 
reconciling  merits  of  the  death  of  Jesus. 


8 


The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


The  angels,  we  aver,  cannot  consistently,  from  the 
whole  texture  of  the  story,  be  thought  to  have  particu- 
larized in  their  song.  This  becomes  more  especially 
clear  beyond  any  dispute  when  we  take  the  doxology 
together  with  the  preceding  context,  v.  11.  Here  the 
single  angel  who  was  first  on  the  scene  announced  "good 
tidings  of  great  joy  to  all  the  people,"  that  is,  the  people 
of  Israel — as  Alford  himself  insists  that  the  construction 
must  be.  jSTow  the  message  of  the  single  angel  was 
avowedly  and  concededly  for  the  behoof  of  the  Jews  as 
a  body.  Is  it  then  in  any  manner  reconcilable  with  such 
antecedent  announcement  that  "the  multitude  of  the 
heavenly  host,"  who  immediately  joined  that  individual 
celestial  messenger,  should  have  differed  from  him  so 
directly  and  glaringly  as  to  use  a  language  which  implied 
proclamation  of  peace  only  to  the  elect  few  or  the  smaller 
number  of  "men  of  good  pleasure,"  and  these  called  so 
only  potentially,  in  respect  to  their  choice  of  belief  in 
Paul's  later  developed  dogmatic  theory? 

We  will  yet  mention  another  popular  theological 
work,  in  which  the  same  dogmatism  is  presumed  to 
have  impliedly  been  forecast  in  the  doxology.  We 
mean  Lange's  Bible  Commentary.  In  it  the  eminent 
American  theologian,  Philip  Schaff,  comes  to  decide 
substantially,^'^  after  some  longer  discussion,  on  the 
same  exposition  with  Alford.  He  too  ultimately 
determines  upon  the  reading  "eudoldas,"  for  the 
"weightier  authority"  it  has  for  itself.  And  he  con- 
strues the  sentence:  "Glory  to  God  in  the  highest 
and  peace  (or  salvation)  on  earth  among  men  of  His 
good    pleasure."      These    are    to    him  ,  God's    chosen 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.         9 

people" — Alford's  "elect."  To  them,  lie  reasons,  God 
feels  good-will  or  gracious  pleasure,  for  tlieir  (eventual) 
reconciliation  to  Himself  by  Christ.  For  this  senti- 
ment he,  like  Alford,  refers  to  2  Cor.  V.19. 

The  learned  Farrar,  in  'The  Life  of  Christ,'  keeps 
on  the  same  line  of  Pauline  dogmatic  forecast,  coincides 
in  the  reading  of  "eudokias,"  and  translates:  "and  on 
earth  peace  among  men  of  good  will."  Upon  which 
Geikie,  in  'Life  and  Words  of  Christ,'  I.  p.  560,  observes 
very  forcibly  and  pertinently :  "the  introduction  of  the 
idea  of  the  elect  as  those  to  whom  only  the  message  of 
the  Saviour  is  proclaimed  by  the  angels  is  equally 
opposed  to  the  declarations  of  God's  loving  the  world, 
and  to  the  grandeur  of  Christ's  mission."  We  note  this 
commendable  opposition  to  the  ordinary  run^*^  of 
conservative  Protestant  exegesis  as  a  gratifying  offset  to 
the  widely  prevailing  self-conscious  pretension  that  the 
doxology  admits  only  of  the  narrow  Pauline  construc- 
tion. 

jSTo,  we  insist,  with  such  dogmatic  turn  and  aim 
the  doxology  would  stand  out  as  a  graceless,  forced, 
even  harsh  sentence,  entirely  incongruous  with  the 
circumstances  into  which  it  is  set  by  the  gospel 
writer.  The  scene  as  recorded  purports  to  be  one  of 
angelic  epiphany,  at  which  unlettered  Jewish  shepherds 
were  the  only  attendants.  They  could  not  possibly,  we 
assert  again,  have  fathomed  the  dogmatic  mystery 
developed  by  Paul  at  a  later  stage.  ISTay,  we  fear  no 
sensible  contradiction  in  declaring,  that  no  other  Jew  in 
the  wide  land  of  Palestine  could  have  interpreted  the 
doxology,  when  published  by  the  shepherds,  in  a  Pauline 


10  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

tiinij  as  no  one  was  then  able  to  prognosticate  this 
apostle's  subsequent  theory  of  Eeconciliation  as  the  aim 
and  end  of  the  life  of  Christ.  Is^ot  that  the  angels  them- 
selves had  not  the  gift  or  power  of  such  prescience.  To 
supernatural  beings  to  whom  fhe  most  unnatural  things 
are  possible,  such  foreknowledge,  too,  must  have  been 
a  matter  of  course.  Eegarding  the  angels  by  themselves 
they  could,  then,  certainly  be  most  safely  credited  with 
a  Pauline  construction  of  their  song.  But  as  their 
message  was  intended  for  the  understanding  of  the  shep- 
herds, and,  subsequently,  other  plain  folk,  it  must 
consistently  have  been  couched  in  words  which  they 
could  readily  grasp  and  with  the  substantial  drift  of 
which  they  were  familiar. 

But  yet  from  another  point  of  view  this  internal 
difficulty  might  promptly  be  lifted.  This  is,  that  Luke's 
whole  narration  be  supposed  as  having  undergone  at  his 
hands  a  transformation  peculiar  to  his  own  dogmatic 
position.  Looked  at  in  this  light,  it  would  indeed  be 
quite  conceivable  that  the  doxology  should  bear  a 
Pauline  trend.  Luke  was  unquestionably  a  Paulinist. 
He  is  therefore  consistently  expected  to  have  written  in 
the  style,  tone,  and  train  of  thought  of  the  apostle  whose 
system  he  had  embraced.  Paul's  avowed  doctrine  was 
that  peace  of  men  with  God  was  won  back  by  Christ's 
sacrifice.  This  he  laid  down  prominently  in  Eom.  Y, 
1  sq.  The  theory  is  propounded  in  a  twofold  bearing  in 
Eph.  II.  14-18,  where  Paul  dwells  first  on  the  peaceful 
effect  of  the  sacrifice  on  the  cross  in  drawing  Jews  and 
Gentiles  into  one,  united,  new  body,  and,  again,  on  the 
reconciliation  to  God  of  this  body  of  Christians  newly 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       11 

made  t'liroiigli  that  very  sacrifice.  On  the  supposition, 
then,  that  as  a  Pauline  votary  Luke  created  his  doxology 
from  his  own  mind  so  doctrinated,  its  sense  woukl  be 
about  thus:  "Glory  (be  or  is)  to  God  in  the  highest, 
and  peace  (with  God  is)  on  earth  (viz.,  in  men's 
spiritual  relations,  and  in  respect  to  their  sinful  state), 
good  pleasure  (from  God  is)  among  men."  The  last 
clause  would  suit  well  enough  as  a  sort  of  amplifying 
parallel  of  the  second.  "Good  pleasure"  could  be  taken 
as  corresponding  to  the  Hebrew  word  chen  "grace"  or 
"favor,"  as  used  in  Pro  v.  III.  4. 

ANOTHER  PPvOVISIOXAL  HYPOTHESIS. 

Having  thus  allowed  provisionally  for  a  Pauline 
dogmatic  apprehension  of  Luke's  doxology,  it  is  pertinent 
to  broach  in  this  place  the  hypothesis  of  yet  another 
doctrinal  implication  of  that  sentence,  ere  we  bring 
forward  our  own  interpretation  of  it.  Let  us  remember 
— what  is  presumed  by  excellent  modern  authorities — 
that  both  Luke  and  Acts  come  from  one  and  the  same 
writer.  Xow  when  we  compare  the  speech  assigned  to 
Peter  in  Acts  X.  34  sq.,  we  meet  with  an  expression 
which  bears  also  on  the  sinful  state  oi  man,  yet  is  utterly 
free  from  the  specific  Pauline  stamp  of  Atonement. 

Peter  is  there  introduced  as  speaking  of  God  having 
announced  "good  tiding-s  of  peace  through  Jesus 
Christ." ^^^  These  "good  tidings"  are,  from  the  plain 
import  of  the  context,  no  other  than  Jesus'  preaching, 
from  the  outstart  of  his  public  career,  of  the  same  call 
which  his  relative,  John  the  Baptist,  addressed  to  the 
people:  "Repent  ye;  for  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  at 
hand." 


12  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Peter,  we  propose,  may  in  his  speech  have  understood 
the  "peace"  preached  by  Jesus  either  as  the  personal 
peace  one  has  with  his  own  soul,  or,  what  is  more  likely, 
the  peaceful  relations  with  God  coming  through  the  new 
faith.  In  either  respect  he  must  have  held  before  his 
mind,  judging  from  his  otherwise  recorded  doctrinal 
standpoint,  the  remission  of  sins^^^  as  giving  such  peace. 
And  in  either  case,  too,  the  peace  attained  through  the 
message  and  mission  of  Jesus  is,  viewed  conclusively, 
kindred  to  Paul's  reconciliation  theory:  the  difference 
between  both  apostles  being  only,  that  Paul  makes  the 
suffering  and  death  of  Jesus  the  means  of  salvation,  while 
Peter  sees  Jesus'  surpassing  agency  of  salvation  both  in 
his  life  and  death;  for  while  living  he  preached  repent- 
ance to  his  countrymen,  and  in  his  sainted  state  he 
continued  to  work  remission  of  sins  (see  also  ib.  43  and 
V.  31). 

jSTow  we  think  it  supposable  at  least  that  Luke 
alluded  in  the  doxology  tacitly  to  the  "good  tidings  of 
peace,"  preached  by  Jesus,  and  that  accordingly  his 
doxological  phrase  "on  earth  peace"  (of  which  the 
subsequent  clause  is  easily  accounted  as  a  germane 
parallel),  bears  the  dogmatic  sense  of  peace  coming 
to  sinners  through  Jesus,  the  new-born  Messiah.  To 
be  sure,  not  much  would  be  gained  by  such 
interpretation.  It  would  be  merely  a  substitution  of 
Petrine  in  place  of  Pauline  dogmatism.  Against  it, 
too,  there  would  lie  the  same  objection  stated  before — 
that  the  angels  would  appear  as  dogmatic  reasoners,  and 
with  a  message  so  ill-suited  to  the  unprophetic  mental 
capacity  of  the  shepherds.     This  grave  difficulty,  again. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       13 

could  only  be  overcome  by  tlie  view  already  above 
advanced,  that  Luke  created  tlie  doxology  from  his  own 
mind.  Upon  this  idea,  indeed,  a  Petrine  no  less  than  a 
Pauline  tendency  could  safely  be  assigned  to  it. 

OUE  FIXAL  COXSTRUCTIOX. 

After  this  preliminary  discussion  we  will  proceed 
to  our  own  explanation  of  the  doxology.  We  believe 
it  to  be  a  much  more  unlabored  construction  of  its 
tenor,  and  to  harmonize  so  much  better  with  the 
temporal  and  circumstantial  postulates  of  the  whole 
narrative  of  our  synoptic.  We  suggest  in  the  first  place, 
that  this  WTiter  drew^  it  from  an  original  Jewish 
Christian  source,  ^^^  in  which  the  event  of  the  birth  of 
Jesus  was  described  in  a  brilliant  and  majestic  style 
commensurate  ^^dtll  the  signal  event  itself.  In  it  the 
epiphany  of  angels  proclaiming  the  occurrence  and 
intoning  a  momentous  anthem  in  its  honor,  was  the 
point  of  eclat  which  should  prominently  address  itself 
to  every  hearer  to  whom  the  happy  tidings  would  be 
communicated,  and  as  well  to  every  future  reader  of  its 
record.  The  depiction  of  the  scene  proper,  we  remark, 
offered  no  difficulty  at  all.  Yet  a  Hebrew  Scriptural 
parallel,  for  which  the  author  was  doubtless  looking  as 
a  model  upon  which  to  form  his  0"\vn  composition,  was 
not  so  ready  to  hand.  While  pondering  to  what  suitable 
Hebrew  illustration  he  might  turn  for  the  supply  of  a 
fit  descriptive  setting,  he  was,  we  surmise,  suddenly 
struck  with  the  adaptation  to  his  purpose  of  Ps. 
CXLYIII.  The  leading  antithesis,  in  this  psalm,  of 
heaven  and  earth  being  called  upon  to  praise  God,  would 


14  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

offer  an  apt  outline  for  his  own  brief  doxological  contrast 
of  heaven  and  earth.  For  this  first  clause — the  sum- 
mons of  the  angels  to  themselves  to  give  "Glory  to  God 
in  the  highest" — ^^^  verse  1  of  the  psalm  could  be 
turned  to  good  account.  Then  he  would  pass  in  his 
mind  to  the  analogy  of  the  psalmist's  call  upon  the 
things  and  creatures  of  the  earth,  in  verse  7,  to  also 
offer  praise  to  the  Lord.  The  contrast  of  the  earthly 
praise  the  evangelist  w^ould  consequently  bring  out  in 
the  two  succeeding  clauses  of  the  doxology.  The  second 
clause  would,  conformably  to  that  verse,  have  to  be 
understood:  "and  (glory  to  God  be)  on  earth  (i.  e. 
from  all  its  creatures,  for  there  is — incipiently — on 
earth)  peace."  The  third  clause  would  range  fitly  with 
the  second,  having  likewise,  as  we  will  immediately 
show,  a  direct  Messianic  import.  "Men"  are  here 
specified  as  the  chief  or  rather,  considered  prosaically 
and  practically,  the  only  creatures  from  whom  praise 
was  due  to  God. 

Let  us,  before  w^e  go  on,  state  summarily  that  it  is 
impossible  for  us  to  assume  for  the  entire  sentence  any 
other  reference  than  merely  the  birth  of  Jesus  in  his 
Messianic  character,  and  in  its  Jewish  national  point  of 
view.^^^  It  is,  we  affirm  confidently,  a  Messianic 
hallelujah,  and  purported  originally  to  be  nothing  else. 
With  this  apprehension  agrees  perfectly  the  choice  of  the 
words  "peace"  and  "good  pleasure."  The  Messianic 
bearing  of  both  is  completely  warranted  in  Hebrew 
Scripture,  or,  to  speak  more  accurately,  in  that  Scrip- 
tural phraseology  customarily  construed  as  Messianic. 

"Peace"  was  in  old  prophetic  passages  as  wtII  as  in 


Presages  of  a  Coining  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       15 

the  minds  of  later  Messianic  hopers,  directly  and  closely 
combined  with  the  reign  of  Messiah  as  Israel's  future 
world-ruler,  or  generally  with  the  longed-for  golden 
era  to  be.  How  far  Luke  may  have  aimed  to  extend  in 
his  doxology  the  significance  of  the  original  Hebrew 
word  shalom  "peace,"  we  have  no  means  of  ascertain- 
ing. On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  worth  while  to 
observe  that  the  word  bore  with  the  ancient  Hebre-^vs 
a  most  comprehensive  meaning.  It  signified  so  much 
more  than  a  mere  cessation  of  warfare  or  negation  of 
strife.  It  denoted  good  health;  freedom  from  care, 
chiefly  a  condition  and  feeling  of  security  (cp. 
especially  Isa.  XXVI.  3);  peace  in  every  sense  of  the 
word;  also  kindliness,  friendship  and  good-will;  further- 
more, as  it  seems,  even  jDeace  of  the  soul  in  regard  to 
himian  sinfulness  (cp.  Isa.  LYII.  19);  and  lastly, 
prosperity.  ^^^^  The  root-essence  of  the  word  "shalom" 
is  total  and  thoroug"]!  happiness  in  all  respects  of  human 
life.  It  more  often  signifies  weal  or  welfare  than  peace, 
in  the  sense  commonly  attached  to  this  word. 

Respecting  eudokia  "good  pleasure"  of  the  third 
clause,  we  think  the  original  writer  alluded  to  some  such 
expression  as  the  Hebrew  shenath  ratson  "the  acceptable 
year,"  or  "  year  of  grace,"  in  Isa.  LXI.  2,^^^^  In  this 
place  ratson  "grace"  has  unquestionably  an  exclusively 
Messianic,  or,  to  give  it  more  correctly,  redemptive 
bearing.  The  implication  of  the  third  clause  would  then 
be :  as  chief  among  the  creatures  of  the  earth,  men  are 
called  upon  to  give  praise  to  God,  for  wdth  the  birth  of 
Jesus  as  the  Messiah  there  begins  a  new  era  of  God's 
"good  pleasure  in  (or  tow^ards)  men."     The  determining 


16  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

idea  of  the  terse  statement  of  this  third  clause  is,  that 
God  has  at  last  had  loving  compassion  on  Israel.  He 
has  relented  to  them  in  regard  to  the  score  of  past  sins/^^^ 
his  mercy  prevailing  over  the  stern  sense  and  rigid 
measure  of  condign  judgment.  Moved  by  his  mercy, 
he  has  now  sent  the  long-expected  Messiah.  "With  his 
coming  the  eternal  "year  of  grace" — the  interminable 
golden  age — opened  for  Israel. 

That  the  tacit  reference  to  sin  should  have  been  at 
the  root  of  the  leading  thought  of  the  third  clause  of  the 
doxology  is  a  supposition  for  which  there  could  be 
adduced  multifarious  authentic  evidence,  alike  from 
Rabbinic  and  I^ew  Testament  literature.  Let  us 
remark,  further,  tli^at  according  to  our  exposition  the 
third  clause  would  not  really  be  an  amplifying  parallel 
of  the  second,  but  a  kind  of  new  argument  explanatory 
of  all  that  preceded  in  the  sentence.  The  explanation 
consists  in  the  point  of  view  inherent  in  the  expression 
"good  pleasure,"  namely,  that  God,  having  now 
vouchsafed  it  to  Israel,  made  it  possible  that  the 
Messianic  "peace"  era,  marked  in  the  second  clause,  could 
at  last  arrive.  Following  out  the  words  of  the  delivered 
text  of  the  clause,  we  would  have  it  understood :  "(for) 
among  (or  in  regard  to)  men  (there  is  God's)  good 
pleasure." 

The  whole  sentence  would  thus  prove  to  be  a 
purely  Messianic  one.  The  angels  were  chanting  God's 
praise  and  also  calling  upon  the  whole  terrestrial  creation 
to  chime  in  with  or  follow  them  in  his  glorification,  for 
the  great  event  of  the  arrival  of  the  Messiah  which 
secures  "peace"  and  betokens  God's  "good  pleasure." 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of_  Peace.       17 

The  stress  of  the  whole  sentence  rests  however,  we 
maintain,  on  the  middle  clause,  which  represents  "peace" 
as  the  paramount  signature  of  the  reign  of  the  new-born 
Messiah.  Peace,  truly,  marked  out  pre-eminently 
Israel's  hope  for  the  Messianic  empire.  It  was  the  very 
pith  of  their  national  expectations  for  the  future.  Its 
meaning  was,  as  aforesaid,  most  comprehensive,  and  was 
above  all  that  of  security,  ^-^^^  in  particular,  security 
from  external  enemies  and  the  intermeddling  and 
oppression  of  foreign  powers.  As  such  it  formed,  as  it 
were,  the  key-note  of  the  pathetic  Messianic  melody 
which  resounded  so  intensely  and  fervidly  in  the 
unfortunate  stages  of  Israel's  history,  when  they  were 
troubled  by  foreign  invasions  or  became  subject  to 
foreign  tyranny.  As  'peace'  was  innermost  in  the 
consciousness  of  the  people  at  large  and  cherished  by 
them  with  fondest  craving,  so  it  became  foremost  also 
in  the  orations  of  their  prophets,  who  were  their  spiritual 
guides  and  the  exalted  and  sympathetic  interpreters  of 
their  national  feelings  and  hopes.  We  meet  with  it  in 
the  prophetic  portraitures  of  the  Messianic  era  to  come, 
or  the  rule  in  it  of  the  ideal  king,  as  the  predominant 
view  of  those  inspired  seers.  They  Avould  inseparably 
associate  it  with  the  auspicious  configuration  of  that 
fancied  futurity,  as  its  genuine  and  chief  characteristic. 

It  will  not  be  too  much  to  bring  for  it  some  suitable 
Scriptural  illustrations.  We  select  purposely  relative 
utterances  of  three  contemporary  prophets,  as  we  believe 
that  they  are  not  only  truly  classical  specimens  of 
prophetic  effusion,  but  otherwise  best  adapted  to 
elucidate  the  point,  that  peace  was  the  leading  Israelitish 


18  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

conception  of  tlie  character  of  Messiali  and  the  Messianic 
era.  Yet  before  we  consider  those  prophetic  passages 
we  must  briefly  anticipate  that  we  will  later  (in  the  third 
chapter)  make  out  conclusively,  and  we  regret  to  add, 
also  disenchantingiy,  that  the  notion  of  the  Messiah's 
role  and  rule  of  peace  must  essentially  be  modified,  to 
be  made  to  accord  even  with  the  innermost  and  rational 
presuppositions  of  its  very  prophetic  exponents 
themselves. 

JSTow  when  we  wish  to  take  a  glance  at  the  prophetic 
peace  prospects  of  futurity,  there  naturally  occurs  first 
the  well-known  and  often  rehearsed  picture  of  the  golden 
age  of  universal  peace.  Both  contemporary  prophets, 
Isaiah  and  Micah,  have  so  beautifully,  nay  gorgeously, 
with  little  divergence  from  each  other,  portrayed  that 
ideal  futurity  in  chapts.  II.  2-4  and  IV.  1-5  respectively. 
A  delightful  vision  that  was  indeed.  Possibly  it  existed 
already  before  their  time  in  a  fairly  settled  formula, 
and  they  adopted  it  for  temporary  purposes  of  teaching 
and  lifting  up  the  courage  and  hope  of  their  countrymen. 
Fiirst  (Hist,  of  the  Bibl.  Lit.  II.  302),  following  other 
notable  commentators  (Hitzig  and  Ewald),  assigns  that 
vision  as  the  production  of  the  much  older  prophet, 
Joel,  ^^*^  and  holds  that  those  later  prophets  took  their 
glowing  picture  of  futurity  from  this  already  previously 
extant  source. 

ISTow  the  essence  of  their  prediction  is,  that  Zion- 
Jerusalem  would  be  the  terrestrial  center  of  Jehovah's 
world-dominion,  a  dominion  carried  on  by  the  mysterious 
means  of  revealed  judgments  and  instructions,  issuing 
forth  ever  newly,  as  each  case  might  require,  from  that 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Em  of  Peace.        19 

central  abode  of  his  Presence.  The  revealed  instructions 
— "Torah"  in  Hebrew,  and  probably  apprehended  in  the 
double  sense  of  commanding  and  teaching — would 
address  themselves  respectively  to  all  nations  of  the 
world.  These  nations  would,  partly  self-impelled  and 
partly  overawed  by  the  majestic  dominion  of  Jehovah, 
be  moved  to  consult  those  Jerusalemite  peace  oracles. 
Consequently,  implements  and  instruments  of  war  would 
be  useless  and  out  of  place  in  those  elysian  days  of  the 
future.  (For  a  restricted  sense,  accurately  to  be  put  on 
the  meaning  of  that  bright  picture  of  future  peace 
according  to  the  ultimate  view  of  the  prophet  Micah,  we 
refer  to  our  note  14.) 

The  same  sentiment  is  substantially  implied  in 
those  prophecies  in  which  an  ideal  Davidide  kino-  is 
expressly  promised  to  come.  Only  that  in  these 
distinctly  personal  Messianic  presages  it  is  the  Davidic 
potentate  himself  who  will  exercise  the  various  central 
governmental  functions.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  he  is 
not  to  be  understood  as  doing  it  entirely  from  his  own 
mind  and  will.  No,  ohe  wisdom  and  power  of  God  pass 
to  him  by  virtue  of  his  sacred  ordination  (the  outpouring 
of  the  ritual  oil  symbolizing  the  outpouring  of  God's 
spirit — and  this  spirit  conceived  in  the  intensity  of 
immediate  emanation  and  prophetic  capacity.)  This 
ordination,  too,  makes  him  God's  plenipotentiary 
representative  on  earth.  There  arises  thus  between  the 
terrestrial  and  the  heavenly  n,iler  a  certain  spiritual 
solidarity  and  mystical  union,  rendering  the  former's 
judicial  and  political  proceedings  as  one  in  quality  and 
substance  with  God's  own  decrees  and  acts. 


20  The  Clirisimas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Conformably  to  this  settled  notion  we  find  in  I. 
Zechariali^-^^^  (cli,  IX,)  the  peace  role  of  arbitration, 
assigned  to  the  ideal  Davidide  king,  assimilated  in  its 
features  to  that  of  which  the  two  before-quoted  prophets, 
Isaiah  and  Micah,  speak  in  their  picture  of  the  halcyon 
days  to  come.  As  in  this  picture  it  is  God  himself  who 
as  supreme  Judge  issues  from  his  Zionite  central  seat 
his  sanctions  of  arbitration  between  nations  (Isa.  II.  4), 
so  will  his  representative  Anointed  of  the  future  "speak 
peace  to  the  nations"  (Zech.  IX.  10),  from  his  central 
court  in  Jerusalem.  This  means  that,  his  authority 
being  world-wide,  as  it  will  reach  "from  sea  to  sea  and 
from  the  river  to  the  ends  of  the  earth"  (ib.  v.  10),^^^^ 
his  decisions  of  arbitration  between  quarrelling  nations 
will  prove  as  inviolable  as  God's  own  relative  decrees 
are  infallible  and  final.  ^^^^  And  those  decisions,  too, 
are  all  inspired  by  his  love  of  peace  (or,  what  come^  to 
the  same  thing,  his  principle  of  righteousness,  as  peace 
is  by  the  same  prophet  (Isa.  XXXII.  17)  most  truly  said 
to  be  the  outcome  and  product  of  righteousness).  His 
pacific  disposition  is  even  remarkable  in  his  public 
appearance,  for  he  comes  entering  his  capital  horseless 
and  chariotless,^-^^^  devoid  of  any  appurtenances 
suggestive  alike  of  warfare  and  loftiness.  In  fact,  all 
warlike  implements  would  at  that  time  be  entirely 
extinct  from  the  whole  territory  of  Israel  (ibid.  9,  10). 

Let  us  view  another  kindred  representation.  The 
prophet  Micah,  a  younger  contemporary  of  I.  Zechariah, 
who  like  him  witnessed  the  disastrous  Assyrian  invasions, 
held  out  the  coming  of  a  new  Davidide  king  "great  unto 
the  ends  of  the  earth/' ^^^^  who  would  be  strong  enough 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        21 

to  cope  successfully  with  Israel's  arch-enemy,  Assyria, 
and  be  himself  "peace"  (V.  4) — that  is  to  say,  his  very 
name  would  stand  for  peace  (cp.  also  Judges  VI.  24). 
This  ideal  monarch  would  raise  Israel  into  a  mighty 
nation,  dreaded  by  all  others,  so  that  they  would  no  more 
have  to  tremble  for  fear  of  foreign  intrusion  and 
oppression.  Eventually,  then,  horses  and  chariots  and 
fortifications  would  no  more  be  needed  in  the  Jewish 
land,  as  all  the  aggressive  foes  would  be  cut  off  and  all 
would-be  hostile  powers  held  in  check  and  at  a  com- 
pulsory distance.  Serene  peace  and  sweet  security 
would  prevail  at  home  under  the  potent  sway  of  that 
august  ruler  (V.  1-10). 

The  prophet  Isaiah,  living  in  the  same  gloomy  and 
troublous  times  of  the  Assyrian  invasions,  promised 
likewise  not  only  an  era  of  peace  and  rest  from  foreign 
hostilities,  but  the  coming  of  an  ideaLDavidide  king, 
endowed  in  the  manner  set  forth  in  XL  1-10.  On  the 
much  disputed  point  whether  Isaiah  had  here  before  his 
mind  his  greatly  admired  and  highly  exalted  kingly 
friend,  Hezekiah,^^^^  we  cannot  dwell.  What  we  wish 
to  mark  here  is,  that  the  prophet  delineated  the  glorious 
future  Davidide  as  a  marvel  of  a  wise  and  powerful 
sovereign,  under  whom  peace  would  flourish  universally, 
even  in  the  animal  kingdom.  In  ch.  IX.  5,^^^^  that 
prospective  ruler  is,  among  other  illustrious  appellations, 
denoted  "prince  of  peace."  It  is  further  enunciated, 
that  his  dominion  would  be  boundless  alike  in  power 
and  peace  (v.  6). 

The  preceding  illustrations  may  be  sufficient  to  show 
authentically  that  the  principal  feature  in  the  character 


22 


The  CJiiistmas  Motto,  and  the  Frophetic 


of  the  ideal  Anointed  was  held  to  be  peace.  The 
prophets  had  rendered  it  so,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  people  fell  in  Avith  them  in  those  exalted  hopes 
for  the  future.  As  time  went  on  and  political  misery 
and  social  suffering  engendered  all  the  more  intense 
cravings  for  deliverance,  that  fundamental  feature  must 
have  presented  itself  and  pressed  forward  so  much  more 
vividly,  and  laid  so  much  stronger  hold  on  the  popular 
mind.  Is  it  accordingly  not  fair  to  presume  that 
likewise  in  the  time  of  Jesus  when,  as  we  maintain  on 
incontrovertible  grounds,  the  high  Messianic  fervor  had 
already  run  a  course  of  well-nigh  a  century,  the  figure 
of  the  prophetic  "prince  of  peace" — Israel's  very 
'pacifer' — stood  out  in  the  fancy  of  thousands  of 
Palestinian  Jews  (the  Sadducees,  Zealots  and,  possibly, 
theosophic  Essenes  excepted)  with  the  brightest  hues  of 
comfort  and  consolation,  gleaming  with  quickening 
force  over  their  national  plight  and  misery?  It  was 
naturally  the  Messianic  consolatory  traits  of  peace,  at 
which  we  might  well  imagine  the  desperate  thoughts 
of  the  Jewish  people  would  anxiously  grasp  in  the  woeful 
Herodian-Eoman  epoch  of  misrule,  repressions  and 
exactions.  Peace — in  the  deep  and  extensive  bearing 
the  Hebrew  word  "shalom"  had  in  the  sentiment  of  the 
Jewish  people — was  never  more  needed  than  at  that 
hapless  epoch.  Luke,  then  (or  the  original  writer  whose 
record  he  used),  will  only  have  given  utterance  to  the 
very  substratum  of  the  Jewish  Messianic  hope,  when 
he  introduced  in  the  doxology  the  thought  of  the  newly 
begun  reign  of  Messiah  under  the  fonnula,  "and  on 
earth  peace." 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       23 

It  proclaimed  in  substiince  that  the  long  budded 
Messianic  hope  had  at  last  flowered  out  with  brightest 
bloom  into  that  precious  peace,  which  was  the  salient  and 
all-important  burden  of  prophetic  promise  in  centuries 
of  Yore. 

This  our  opinion  that  Luke  made  in  the  doxology 
no  other  but  a  mere  Messianic  allusion,  and  in  the 
traditional  point  of  view,  may  be  supported  yet  by 
another  circumstance.  We  refer  to  the  expression, 
"gospel  of  peace"  in  Acts  X.  36.  That  it  has  an 
identical  meaning  with  Luke's  gospel  of  the  "kingdom 
of  God"  is,  we  remark,  all  but  accidental.  It  signifies 
to  us  that  in  the  thought  of  the  evangelic  author  of  Luke 
and  Acts  the  one  concept  was  merged  into  the  other, 
so  that  the  'kingdom  of  God'  could  stand  interchange- 
ably for  'peace.'  By  this  kingdom  was  meant  the 
Messianic.  Under  the  technical  appellation  'kingdom 
of  God'  (or  'Heaven')  the  reign  of  Messiah  passed 
currently  on  the  lips  of  every  orthodox  Jewish  person 
in  the  century  of  Jesus.  Peace,  then,  which  was  so 
markedly  and  generally  identified  with  the  reign  of 
Messiah,  presented  itself  so  very  naturally  as  the  leading 
point  of  Messianic  consideration  also  to  the  author  of  the 
doxology.  The  role  and  rule  of  Messiah  were  by 
traditionary  conception  settled  to  be  those  of  peace. 
The  doxology,  for  its  part,  gives  expression  to  it  too. 
We  can  consistently  see  in  the  whole  sentence  nothing 
but  a  proclamation  bearing  the  Jewish  national  type. 
There  will  accordingly  be  no  need  of  having  recourse 
to  the  later  theology  of  either  Paul  or  Peter,  to  supply 
its  internal  motive. 


24 


Tlie  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


CHAPTEK  11. 


We  liave  in  this  connection  to  settle  yet  another 
difficulty  wliioh  offers  itself  to  the  careful  reader  of  the 
New  Testament.  This  is,  that  Matthew  X.  34  sq. 
(compare  Luke  XII.  51-53)  apparently  runs  counter  to 
the  peace  role  of  the  Messiah  which,  as  set  forth  in  the 
foregoing,  is  readily  discoverable  in  Luke's  pithy 
doxology.  In  Matthew  (1.  c.)  there  occurs  the  well- 
known  passage:  ''Think  not  that  I  am  come  to  send 
peace  on  earth;  I  came  not  to  send  peace,  but  a  sword, 
g|-g  »(22)  rpi^jg  sounds  surely  like  a  warlike  avowal!  It 
must  puzzle  and  confound  the  ordinary  reader  who, 
from  his  general  knowledge  of  prophetic  lore,  can 
associate  with  the  Messiah  nothing  but  the  rule  of  peace 
and  tranquillity.  Xay,  more;  it  appears  in  sharp 
opposition  to  the  picture  otherwise  portrayed  in  the 
gospels  q|  the  character  and  principles  of  Jesus.  He 
passes  notoriously  in  those  writings  as  mild  and  meek 
and  all  but  the  bringer  of  the  men-destroying  sword. 
A  glance  at  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (Matt.  V.  38-42) 
is  sufficient  to  satisfy  every  one  that  a  mission  of  strife 
and  discord  cannot  consistently  be  imputed  to  Jesus 
as  characteristic  of  his  ethical  position.  And  certainly 
is  the  application  to  Jesus  of  Isa.  XLII.  1-4,  made  in 
Matthew  XII.  17-21,  strong  enough  evidence  that  the 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Em  of  Peace. 


25 


writer  of  tliis  gospel  had  conceived  of  tlie  Master  as 
called  only  to  the  beneticent  career  of  peace,  and  not  to 
the  agency  of  the  tnmult  and  violence  of  war.^^^^ 

And  yet  is  Jesus  in  the  before-noted  passage  alleged 
to  have  announced  himself  openly  and  directly  as  a 
bringer  not  of  peace  but  of  the  sword!  How  is  this  to 
be  reconciled  with  the  general  portraiture  of  Jesus  as  the 
mild  and  peaceful  Teacher?  How  does  it  particularly 
agree  with  the  postulate,  stereotyped  in  old  Judaism  and 
also  strongly  reflected,  as  we  aimed  to  show,  in  Luke's 
angelic  doxology,  that  the  Messiah  would  be  a  iTiler  of 
peace,  and  its  very  personification?  We  can  allay  those 
glaring  contrasts  only  by  separating  in  our  mind  Jesus' 
ethical  principles  and  the  consciousness  of  his  real, 
glorious  Messiahdom,  to  be  consummated  coextensively 
with  his  second  advent,  ^^'^^  from  his  then  preparatory 
career  of  the  Messianic  kingdom. 

Difficult  as  it  is  to  draw  a  strict  line  of  division 
between  the  being  and  the  coming  of  the  Messianic 
empire — the  Kingdom  of  God  or  Heaven — in  the 
various  relations  in  Avhich  Jesus  dilates  on  this  his  lead- 
ing theme,^^^^  we  may  at  least  logically,  mark  off  the  one 
from  the  other.  There  seems  indeed,  in  the  face  of 
those  contradictory  characteristics,  no  alternative  but  to 
make  that  distinction.  We  could  then  say:  Jesus  as 
the  initiatory  Messiah  shared  in  the  settled  Jewish  tradi- 
tion— a  tradition  to  be  later  illustrated — ^that  discord  is 
to  prevail  as  a  prelude  to  the  Messianic  dominance  proper, 
but  Jesus  as  the  future  and  real  Messiah  could  still  pass 
as  the  coming  peace  ruler,  and  this  according  to  the 
other  prophetically  derived  Jewish  stock  conception,  that 
the  Messianic  reign  is  that  of  thorough  and  lasting  peace. 


26  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

But,  tlie  reader  will  ask,  can  such  distinction,  involv- 
ing the  sharp  opposites  of  strife  and  peace  for  the 
introduction  and  accomplishment  of  the  same  object,  be 
at  all  sustained?  Is  it  possible  that  a  notion  could 
develop  in  Judaism,  showing  forth  the  necessity  of 
those  flagrant  contrasts  succeeding  each  other  in  eventual 
history,  in  order  to  achieve  the  supposed  Providential 
purjDose  of  ultimately  adjusting  the  national  destiny  of 
Israel  ?  It  would  indeed  seem,  upon  common  reasoning, 
impossible,  nay  unnatural  to  presume  a  Providential 
design  requiring  grewsome  contentions  first,  that  sweet 
abiding  peace  might  follow.  But,  in  very  fact,  there 
is  here  really  not  the  question  of  wise  Provi- 
dential disposition  so  much  as  that  of  arbitrary  forma- 
tion of  dogmatic  notions,  propped  by  Scriptural  refer- 
ences, however  flimsy  and  far-fetched  they  might  be. 
Who  should  think,  we  concede  preliminarily  to  the 
inquiring  reader,  that  a  national  body  anxious  for  a  long 
hoped-for  mighty  and  glorious  deliverer  and  restorer 
of  ancient  independence  and  prosperous  enlargement, 
should  have  been  driven  to  the  extremity  of  cherishing 
that  brilliant  hope  but  in  the  gloomy  shroud  of  dread 
disorders  preceding  its  realization?  But  yet  the  Mess- 
ianic problem  has  practically  brought  forth  such  remark- 
able incongruity.  What  we  cannot  reconcile  in  our 
minds  has  actually  been  welded  together  in  the  earlier 
centuries  of  anxious  Messianic  yearning.  Thus  it  came 
that  the  image  of  a  golden  era  of  peace  and  bliss  to  come 
has  been  obscured  by  the  dire  specters  of  violent  dis- 
ruptions, both  in  society  and  nature,  destined  to  occur 
antecedently   to   it.     These    in   their   nature   mutually 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Eva  of  Peace.        27 

exclusive  notions  once  formed,  it  was  a  slight  matter, 
especially  in  times  of  desperate  hope  of  Messianic 
accomplishment,  to  lean  them  severally  on  superficially 
construed  would-be  JMessianic  statements. 

The  incompatibility  of  these  contrary  notions  may 
however,  let  us  yet  say,  be  somewhat  reduced  and 
moderated  by  the  view,  which  we  propose  to  make  clear 
in  the  next  chapter  in  a  full  and  extensive  discussion, 
that  the  whole  expectation  of  everlasting  peace  attached 
to  the  Messianic  government  to  come,  had  even  no 
authentic  and  consistent  support  in  the  very  prophetic 
compositions  which  bore  the  striking  semblance  of  its 
indubitable  and  unconditional  prediction.  This  point 
we  have  to  waive  here,  as  we  desire  first  to  show  the 
probable  cause  which  may  have  originated  Jesus'  utter- 
ance: "Think  not  that  I  am  come  to  send  peace  on 
earth,  etc." 

This  utterance,  we  suggest,  was  a  sort  of  apology  for 
his  course  of  gaining  disciples  and  adherents  with 
apparent  disregard  of  family  ties  and  obligations. 
Whether  or  not  he  met  with  express  reproaches  for  this 
proceeding  in  his  Messianic  career  we  have  no  means  of 
deciding.  But  it  undoubtedly  involved  a  reproach, 
which  we  think  lie  sought  to  extenuate  in  the  discourse 
contained  in  Matt.  X.  34-39.  He  did  so  mainly  by 
advancing,  in  w.  35,  36,  the  conventional  Jewish 
assumption,  that  the  Messianic  times  are  to  be 
ushered  in  by  violent  family  disunion.  This  assump- 
tion, shared  in  alike  by  the  orthodox  Jews  and  Jesus, 
had  its  innocent  source  in  the  misapprehension  of  Micah 
Vil.    0.     In   both    the   Talmud   and    the   gospels   this 


28  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

prophetic  verse  is  utilized  as  tlie  pretended  signature  o£ 
the  Messianic  prelude.  Bewildering  as  it  is  to  the 
modern  critical  mind  to  note  the  utter  intenability  of 
tracing  a  reference  to  Messiah  or  the  Messianic  period  in 
that  passage  of  Micah,  it  is  nevertheless  a  fact  that  old 
Messianic  believers  resorted  to  it  as  a  very  mine  of  latter- 
day  revelation.  But  the  prophet's  words  contain 
positively  no  scintilla  of  such  reference. 

They   are  merely  part   of   a  scathing  reproof   the 
prophet   was  dealing   to    his   contemporaries   for   their 
deplorable    demoralization.     Their    degeneracy,    as    he 
indicates,  had  gone  so  far  that  faith  had  fled  within  the 
closest  associations,  and  hostile  attempts  were  made  by 
the  nearest  of  kin  upon  one  another.     Therefore  the 
prophet  held  out  to  his  countrymen  the  threat  of  an 
exemplary  and  decisive  Divine  judgment, — the  "day  of 
the  (prophetic)  watchmen,  the  visitation"  (v.  4).     :N'ow 
Messiahists  who  scented  eschatological  presages  in  every 
prophetic  rhetorical  threat  of  a  day  of  Divine  chastise- 
ment uttered  in  the  far  past,  seized  also  upon  that  pas- 
sage of  Micah  and  put  on  it  the  stamp  of  an  oracular 
disclosure  of  a  state  of  family  dissensions  to  occur  at  the 
beginning  of  the  far-off  Messianic  period.     The  testi- 
mony of  such  misinterpreting  proceeding  is  supplied  in 
both  the  gospels  and  the  Talmud.     Jesus  had  entered 
upon  that  commonly  accepted  notion,  as  is  evident  from 
the  cited  passage  of  Matthew. 

It  stood  him  in  good  stead,  we  propose,  in  accounting 
for  or  defending  once  for  all  his  mode  of  acquiring  fol- 
lowers. This  was,  his  habitual  demand  to  relinquish 
family  relations  and  surrender  wholly  to  himself  and 
his  cause.     His  repeated  insistence  on  w^ould-be  disciples 


Presages  of  a  Coining  Golden  Eva  of  Peace.        29 

breaking  away  from  the  connections  of  kinship  woukl, 
as  already  suggested,  either  directly  draw  on  him  or  at 
all  events  imply  the  reproach  of  attempting  to  sunder 
deliberately  the  tender  and  affectionate  bonds  of  family, 
and  thus  weaken  the  wholesome  moral  foundation  of 
society.  The  defense  of  this  his  course  we  find  unmis- 
takably, though  only  implicity,  intended  in  the  cited 
passage  of  Matthew,  X.  34-36.  The  trend  of  that  entire 
discourse  of  Jesus,  wdiich  runs  to  v,  39,  w'e  hold  to  be 
concentred  in  his  reproduction  and  adoption  of  that 
passage  of  Micah,  given  in  vv.  35,  36.  And  here,  too, 
he  stood  on  a  Messianic  track,  well-beat-en  and  familiar 
to  his  countrymen.  He  could  readily  be  understood  by 
his  Jewish  hearers.  For,  doubtless,  the  notion  that  the 
signature  of  the  initial  Messiahdom  was  domestic  discord 
and  disruption,  was  already  then  a  settled  tradition  and 
a  current  orthodox  formula.  Jesus  needed  but  to  plant 
himself  upon  it  to  be  promptly  understood  by  Messianic 
hopers.  And  we  assume  that  he  purposely  had  recourse 
to  it  in  the  quoted  gospel  passage,  to  account  practically 
for  the  peculiar  manner  of  his  propaganda.  He  meant 
to  convey  in  that  discourse  of  his,  that  his  urging  upon 
others  to  leave  their  families  that  they  might  "follow" 
him  and  help  forward  the  kingdom  of  God — his  own 
Messianic  kingdom — by  preaching  it  broadcast  (see 
Luke  IX.  60),  ranged  itself  consistently  with  that  fixed 
Jemsh  traditional  presumption,  that  domestic  strife  w^as 
indispensably  precursory  to  the  Messianic  empire.  The 
warrant  for  his  calling  upon  people  to  follow  him  regard- 
less of  family  connections  was  thus  given.  It  was 
in   this  sense  that  he  declared   that  his   (preparatory) 


30  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Messianic  mission  was  one  of  the  'Word"  and  not  of 
"peace." 

That  he  not  only  theoretically  advanced  the  neces- 
sity of  subordinating  all  love  and  attachment  for  parents 
and  nearest  of  kin  to  the  exclusive  concern  for  his  Mess- 
iahdom,  as  we  learn  from  Matt.  (1.  c.  v.  37),  but 
practically  urged  the  abandonment  of  family  for  his 
Messianic  work,  is  irrefutably  attested  in  Matt.  VIII. 
22.(26)  rpi^.g  i^.g  exceptional  position,  then,  he  sought  to 
attenuate  by  bringing  f  orwai-d  that  passage  of  Micah  and 
implicitly  referring  to  the  current  Jewish  tradition 
based  upon  it.  Surely,  this  tradition  was  not  to  the 
effect  that  the  Messiah  himself  should  by  his  speech  and 
action  bring  about  hostile  estrangement  in  families  and 
a  renunciation  of  the  tender  ties  that  bound  their  mem- 
bers together.  Yet  Jesus  referred  to  it  nevertheless  in 
his  effort,  as  we  suppose,  at  justifying  his  peculiar 
propagandist  course. 

As  to  this  tradition,  preserved  in  old  Rabbinical 
lore,  we  are  of  opinion  that  it  originally  coincided  sub- 
stantially with  the  tenor  of  that  passage  of  Micah,  and 
that  it  only  received  changes  and  additions  at  different 
times  according  to  the  political-national  condition  of  the 
Palestinian  Jews.  In  the  Talmud,  treatise  Synhedrin 
f.  97  (compare  Sotah  f.  49),  we  find  already  a  consider- 
ably enlarged  picture  of  the  alleged  dismal  signs  of  the 
initial  Messianic  era :  "In  the  latter  days  beginning  the 
reign  of  Messiah,"  it  is  said  there,  "insolence  will  grow 
apace;  human  worth  be  debased;  wine  be  dear  despite 
its  abundance  (for  the  increasing  debauchery) ;  the  whole 
(Roman)  empire  (including  the  Jewish  land)  turned 
to  idolatry  (or  polytheism),  with  no  one  to  check  or 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       31 

correct  it;  Rabbinical  colleges  will  be  converted  into 
houses  of  lechery;  Galilee  be  devastated  and  the  rest  of 
Palestine  desolated;  the  people  of  the  country  will 
wander  about  homeless  from  to^vn  to  town,  no  one  taking- 
pity  on  them;  the  pious  will  be  despised,  and  truth  be 
wanting;  youth  will  shame  age,  the  son  dishonor  his 
father"— then  follows  literally  Micali  vii.  6. 

This  talmudical  relation  bears  intrinsic  evidence  that 
it  was  gotten  up  into  the  present  form  in  consequence 
of  the  woeful  religious  persecution  of  Hadrian  and  his 
strong  efforts  at  paganizing  the  Jewish  land.  We  may 
therefore  safely  date  it  at  about  the  middle  of  the  second 
century  C.  E. — when  the  remnant  of  the  leading  Judean 
theologians  had  settled  in  (lalilee  for  preserving  and 
cultivating  the  science  and  practice  of  Judaism.  It  is 
plainly  seen  that  that  talmudical  relation  is  quite  exten- 
sively spun  out  from  its  spiritual  origin  and  stock 
passage,  ]\Iicali  VII.  6.  But  this  does  not  concern  us 
here.  What  we  wished  to  demonstrate  was  that  the 
latter  source  served  alike  to  the  Jewish  doctors  and  Jesus 
as  a  sort  of  canon  applied  to  the  initial  part  of  the 
Messianic  times.  In  the  Talmud  a  general  picture  of 
social  confusion  and  perversion  is  elaborated  from  it, 
while  Jesus  has  limited  himself  to  its  bare  quotation  for 
a  countenance  and,  in  a  measure,  for  a  plea  of  a 
prophetic  precedent  to  his  peculiar  missionary 
proceeding. 

On  the  whole,  we  may  say  summarily  that  the 
feature  of  family  discord — Jesus'  bringing  of  the  sword 
— prevailing  at  the  beginning  of  the  Messianic  period, 
was  as  much  a  dogmatic  notion  as  the  whole  established 
trust  in  the  eventual  Messianic  peace  realm,  so  fervidly 


32 


The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


looked  for  on  the  strength  of  other  prophetic  announce- 
ments. Both  were  current  side  by  side,  and,  though 
glaringly  incompatible  in  spirit,  were  yet  on  curiously 
constructed  prophetic  grounds  considered  seriously  and 
dogmatically  as  joint  parts  of  one  same  scheme  of  expec- 
tation and  belief. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        33 


CHAPTER  III. 


Here  we  have  come  to  a  pass  when  we  wish  to  settle 
once  for  all,  for  the  better  and  more  correct  understand- 
ing of  ancient  Messianic  presages,  a  most  important 
point.  This  is  that  all  those  glittering  peace  predictions 
of  a  so-called  Messianic  future,  w'hich  we  encounter  in  the 
olden  prophets  and  which  are  yet  in  our  days  so  very  dog- 
matically construed  as  pregnant  with  the  sense  of  the 
necessary  ultimate  cessation  of  warfare,  were  but 
problematic  utterances  of  poetic  enthusiasm  and  elation 
of  spirit,  with  no  more  foundation  of  probability  than 
what  every  other  glowing  hope  for  a  better  future 
supplies  to  their  authors  or  cherishers.  They  were,  let 
us  say  it  emphatically,  not  inspired  by  any  principle  or 
motive  of  religious  faith.  They  were  in  their  nature 
and  purpose  national,  and  religious  only  in  so  far  as 
nationality  within  the  ancient  Hebrew  polity  was  never 
severed  from  religion.  Yet  while  they  bore  such  a 
national  stamp  merely,  they  are  on  the  other  hand  to  be 
credited  with  a  high  and  excellent  ethical  merit  of  their 
own,  in  that  those  seers'  true  sympathy  with  the  lot  of 
their  countrymen  actuated  mainly  their  prophetic 
imagination  and  intuition  to  produce  and  proclaim  them. 
IMuch  as  the  judgment  of  those  worthy  national-religious 
"watchmen"  was,  that  their  compatriots  had  themselves 
brought  on  the  distress  and  misfortune  with  which  thev 


34  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

were  now  and  then  visited  tlirongli  their  own  deliberate 
waywardness  and  nngratefnl  disregard  of  their  dntie^^ 
towards  the  God  of  their  fathers,  there  burned  yet  in 
their  heart  of  hearts  the  brisk  and  inextinguishable 
flame  of  patriotic  and  fraternal  pity.  This  was  so 
profound  and  ardent  that  it  ever  newly  enkindled  their 
zeal  for  lifting  up  the  depressed  spirits  of  the  people, 
stimulating  their  despondency,  and  allaying  their  fears 
for  the  future,  by  holding  up  as  offsets  against  indispen- 
sable vehement  monitions  and  denunciations  for 
evildoins",  bright  forecasts  of  prosperous  conditions  yet 
to  come  and  be  established. 

It  was,  too,  in  a  most  unique  manner  that  those 
prophetic  preachers  joined  the  threat  of  Jehovah's  blast- 
ing visitations  with  brilliant  visions  of  a  restoration,  even 
in  multiple  proportions,  of  former  happiness  and  national 
greatness.  This  may  have  been  partly  modelled  from 
tlie  old  Mosaic  record,  in  which  promises  and  threat- 
enings  alternate  frequently  in  local  position.  Yet  the 
mode  employed  by  the  prophets  stands  out  as  most 
peculiar  in  that  both  contraries  are  often  not  marked 
off  from  one  another  in  a  clear  and  readily  perceptible 
way.  At  times  they  would  even  frame  their  severe 
threats  by  a  sort  of  prologue  and  epilogue  of  such 
blandishing  restorative  contents  (compare  Isa.  11.  1-4 
and  lY.  and  see  Fuerst,  1.  c.  p.  45).^^'^  In  some 
instances,  as  will  later  be  shown,  those  presages  of  peace 
and  bliss  to  come  were  uttered  even  in  the  face  of  grave 
political  situations  and  social  perils  imminent  on  all 
sides.  They  could  consequently  mean  nothing  else 
than  that  such  blessed  times  had  to  be  bought  at  the  cost 
of  tremendous  previous  struggles. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       35 

Peace,  and  peace  in  the  ample  sense  of  its  equivalent 
Hebrew  word,  was  to  tliose  devout  preachers  really  but 
an  indefinite  eventuality,  whether  pictured  with  the 
vague  outlines  of  the  expression  "in  later  (or  "in  the 
latter")  days" — an  expression  most  elastic  and  allowing 
of  as  much  latitude  of  time  as  fancy  might  be  disposed 
to  clothe  them  with — or  represented  in  some  similar 
indeterminate  manner.  The  fervor  of  tenacious  and 
buoyant  hope,  cherished  despite  the  most  uncertain, 
even  calamitous  actual  state  of  things,  did  not  take  into 
clear  and  serious  account  the  possible  distance  of  that 
consummation  or  the  difiiculties  which  had  to  be  over- 
come in  order  to  reach  it.  The  consummation  would 
consequently  appear  near  enough  at  hand  in  the  feelings 
of  those  prophets,  though  not  in  reality.  Yet  an 
indefinite  eventuality,  with  an  unbanishable  element  of 
precariousness  beneath  the  surface  of  its  prediction,  this 
projective  i>eace  era  must  always  have  been  to  the  most 
enthusiastic  of  those  prophets. 

An  earnest  and  thorough  inquiry  will  prove  convinc- 
ingly that  the  Messianic  peace  presages  of  the  leading 
prophets  Zechariah  I.,  Isaiah  I.,  and  Micah,  who  lived 
and  wrought  in  the  troublous  times  of  the  Assyrian 
invasions,  the  second  half  of  the  eighth  century  B.  C, 
had  in  the  background  a  vast  amount  of  warlike  com- 
plications which  lurked  there  menacingly  and  left  little 
margin  for  the  otherwise  so  ingratiating  and  enchanting 
fancy  of  a  brilliant  and  enduring  peace  era  yet  to  come. 
The  Messianic  king  was  in  fact  but  a  problematically 
eventual  peace  ruler.  And  no  other  construction  can 
be  put  on  the  mere  presages  of  an  ultimate  theocratic 
peace  reign,  in  which  no  express  mention  of  that  ter- 


36  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

restrial  vicegerent  of  Jeliovali  is  made  (thougli  tliis 
relationship  and  condition  were  doubtless  always  lield 
to  be  implied  in  tbem).  These  presages,  too,  could  liave 
bad  but  the  meaning  of  an  ultimate  eventuality,  before 
the  realization  of  Avhich  there  was  ample  cause  for 
apprehending  a  various  range  of  warlike  miseries  and 
fatalities. 

Let  us,  to  sustain  our  assertion,  first  cast  a  glance  at 
presages  of  the  latter  kind.  We  have  already  above 
noted  them.  They  are  the  famous  peace  prophecies  of 
Isaiah  11.  1-4  and  Micah  IV.  1-4.  Precious  sentiments 
those!  Are  they  not?  Yet  we  have  to  say,  when  we 
look  at  those  charming  lines  in  their  local  connection, 
they  must  lose  all  re-assuring  effect  by  the  contrast  of 
war  and  its  dire  circumstances  and  effects  threatened 
in  the  context. 

Those  of  Isaiah  are  preceded  and  followed  by  vig- 
orous denunciating  arraignments  of  Israel^^^^  for  their 
various  unmitigated  perversities  (while,  as  remarked 
before,  the  denunciations  of  chapters  II.  and  III.  may, 
again,  be  considered  as  set  off  by  the  solacing 
epilogue  of  chapter  IV.)  A  fearful  judgment  "day  of 
the  Lord"  is  threatened  the  Judeans  in  ch.  II.  12,  for 
their  false  worship,  practice  of  sorcery,  overwhelming 
self-confidence,  and  profligacy.  This  judgment  God  is 
to  execute,  as  is  indicated  in  ch.  III.  25,  by  the  visitation 
of  destructive  war. 

While  Isaiah  pointed  presumably  in  the  denuncia- 
tory oration  of  ch.  I.  at  the  disastrous  invasion  of  Judah 
by  the  allied  Israelitish  (Ephraimite)  and  Syrian 
armies  under  king  Aliaz,  about  738-34  B.  C,  which 
calamity  was  yet  aggravated  by  the  simultaneous  hostile 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       37 

incursions  of  Edomites  and  Pliilistines  (see  2  Cliron. 
VIII.  17-18),  there  is,  on  tlie  other  hand,  good  reason 
to  believe  that  in  the  denunciations  of  chapters  II.  and 
III.  that  calamity  is  not  the  only  one  to  which  allusion 
is  made.  The  threat  of  that  awful  "day  of  the  Lord" 
can  have  already  implied  in  the  prophet's  mind  the 
apprehension  of  the  terrible  scourge  of  an  Assyrian 
invasion,  supposably  indicated  in  ch.  V.  26-30,  and 
expressly  brought  forward  in  ch.  YII.  17,  20-25,  and 
again  in  ch.  YIII.  6  sq.  That  this  apprehension  was 
already  then  not  distant  from  his  thought  may  be  judged 
from  the  circumstance,  that  he  had  witnessed  from  a 
youth  the  avalanche-like  increase  of  the  Assyrian  great- 
power,  especially  under  the  "destroyer  of  nations," 
Tiglath-Pileser.^^^^  Whether  or  not  it  can  be  made  out 
from  several  extant  cuneiform  inscriptions  that  the 
Judean  king  Uzziali  was  an  eminent  participant  in  the 
war  of  coalition  against  that  mighty  lord  beyond  the 
Tigris,  in  the  year  B.  C.  742,^^°^  (which  had  a  disastrous 
issue  for  all  the  confederates,  though  Uzziah  may  have 
preserved  his  independence),  yet  this  much  we  can  set 
down  as  certain  that  Isaiah  had  already  at  an  early 
period  been  impressed  with  the  grave  perils  to  which  all 
the  western  Asiatic  countries,  including  Israel-Judah, 
were  exposed  from  the  ambitious  and  rapacious  "Assur." 
That  this  impression  had  gTadually  gained  hold  of  his 
mind  is  evident  from  his  free  statement,  that  Assur  was 
the  "rod  of  the  ■\\Tath"  of  Jehovah  (X.  5),  appointed 
as  instrument  to  chastise  all  who  would  incur  it,  Heath- 
ens and  Israelites  alike.  ^^^^ 

'Now  as  we  may,  further,  fairly  assume  with  the 
learned  lexicographer  and  commentator  Gesenius,  that 


38  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

chapter  V.of  Isaiali  was  written  about  tlie  same  time  witli 
tlie  preceding  ones  (see  also  our  note  28),  we  are  all  the 
more  justified  in  detecting  already  in  tlie  threat  of  the 
"day  of  the  Lord"  in  ch.  II.  12,  an  allusion,  in  a  general 
manner,  to  punishing  warlike  aggressions  of  Judah  by 
Assyria.  Unquestionably,  however,  a  definite  reference 
can  rationally  be  fixed  only  to  the  earlier  trouble  which 
came  upon  Judah  from  this  source,  that  is,  the  oppressive 
tributary  dependence  on  the  great-king  Tiglath  Pileser, 
into  which  king  Ahaz  brought  his  country  by  calling 
him  to  assistance  against  the  before-noted  Israelitish- 
Syrian  allies,  ca.  Y34.  While  Tiglath-Pileser  came  as 
an  ostensible  friend  of  the  Judean  king,  yet  the 
relief  he  tendered  was  a  most  dear  acquisition.  It  was 
purchased  at  an  enormous  price,  as  the  Assyrian  despot 
exacted  a  stupendous  compensation  which  was  attended, 
too,  by  Ahaz'  sacrilegious  spoliation  of  the  temple  and  its 
closing  to  the  worship  of  the  God  of  Israel  (2  Chr, 
XXVIII.  20  sq.)  Surely,  these  sad  occuiTences,  so  far 
as  they  are  attributable  to  the  great-king,  cannot  in  the 
least  be  taken  as  coinciding  with  the  sense  of  Isa.  III. 
25,  where  actual  war  is  threatened.  This  Tiglath- 
Pileser  did  certainly  not  attempt  upon  Judah.  Yet 
while  they  may  not  be  accounted  as  under  the  head  of 
that  war  threat,  they  can  fitly  be  considered  as  coming 
Avithin  the  range  of  the  judgment  "day  of  the  Lord,"  in 
ch.  11.  12.  Por  a  severe  and  heavy  enough  visitation 
they  were  indeed,  as  can  clearly  be  seen  from  2  Chr.  1.  c. 
Gesenius  (Commentary  p.  270)  suggests  already  proper- 
ly, that  the  misery  resulting  from  Ahaz'  appeal  to  Tig- 
lath-Pileser for  assistance  was  similar  to  woes  of  war,  as 
the  "tributary  dependence  on  Assyria  was  the  signal  for 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       39 

a  series  of  calamitous  events."  Yet  for  all  that  a  definite 
reference  can,  as  already  remarked,  be  discovered  in 
Isaiah's  denunciatory  orations  of  chapters  II.  and  III. 
only  to  the  ruinous  invasion  of  Judah  by  the  before- 
mentioned  allies.  The  havoc  they  made  all  over  the 
Judean  land  was  enormous  (see  Isa.  VII.  2;  2  Kings 
XVI;  2  Chr.  1.  c.)  The  hostile  onsets  of  the  Philistines 
and  Edomites  who  turned  its  sad  plight  to  account,  added 
only  to  the  general  suffering  and  distress.  Jerusalem 
only  was  spared  (compare  Isa.  I.  8),  and  this  probably 
because  the  opportune  arrival  of  the  Assyi'ian  auxiliary 
forces  averted  its  siege. 

We  have  in  the  foregoing  tried  to  track  out  as  much 
as  might  be,  and  thus  necessarily  at  some  length,  the 
compass  of  the  mental  attitude  and  vision  of  the  prophet 
in  conceiving  and  framing  the  denunciatory  oracles  of 
chapters  II.  and  III.,  and,  in  particular,  the  main  threat 
of  the  judgment  "day  of  the  Lord,"  directly  denounced 
in  ch.  II.  12.  Tor  on  the  establishment  of  the  greater 
extent  of  this  threat  than  would  appear  on  the  surface, 
and  its  gTeater  intensity,  will  depend  the  strength  of  our 
argument  to  be  immediately  brought  forward. 

Now  we  have  seen,  let  us  state  it  summarily,  as 
admitting  of  no  question,  that  that  threatened  judgment 
pointed  to  the  dire  calamity  of  the  Syro-Israelitish  war. 
But  we  believe  to  have  also  made  very  probable  that  this 
together  with  the  threat  of  a  fatal  war  to  be  visited  on 
the  Judeans,  in  ch.  III.  25,  involved  besides,  in  the 
prophet's  apprehensive  intuition  at  least,  warlike  tribu- 
lations to  be  inflicted  by  Assyria. 

The  picture,  then,  reflected  to  us  from  the  prophet's 
denunciatory  chapters  II.  and  III.  is  a  decidedly  and  in- 


40 


The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


tensely  gloomy  one  of  terrible  war  and  destruction. 
When  we  in  the  survey  of  this  picture  combine  with  its 
definite  awful  strokes  the  more  or  less  indistinct,  yet,  as 
we  think,  fairly  traceable  hints  of  woe  threatened  to  be- 
fall the  Judeans,  and  then  hold  over  against  it  the  bright 
and  pompous  enunciation  of  a  coming  era  of  theocratic 
power,  peace  and  bliss,  at  the  head  of  chapter  II.,  what 
a  glaring  and  utterly  irreconcilable  contrast  meets  our 
view! (^2)  Gainsay  it^  if  you  ^\^ll,  but  we  for  our  part 
cannot  but  insist  that  these  precious  sentiments  of 
splendid  and  proud  promise  uttered  before  Judean 
hearers  must,  as  the  oration  advanced,  have  been 
pitifully  drowned  in  the  dismal  din  of  the  weird  denun- 
ciations, in  particular  the  startling  prophetic  forecast  of  a 
destructive  war  (or  wars)  impending  upon  them. 
Jehovah  himself,  who  is  supposed  to  have  inspired  that 
initial  sweet  oracle,  is  later  represented  (in  chapters  Y. 
26,  VII.  18,  and  VIII.  7,  which  are  surely  connected 
in  sense  and  more  or  less  in  time  with  chapters  II.  and 
III.),  as  having  purposed  to  rouse  foreign  powers  to  war- 
like visitations  upon  his  people.  But  aside  from  this 
later  representation,  the  mere  threat  of  coming  war 
could  not  consistently  with  the  settled  principles  of 
Hebrew  religious  faith  be  understood  as  other  than 
designed  and  directed  by  Jehovah, — as  his  Providence 
was  from  of  old,  in  written  -and  in  spoken  words,  taught 
to  comprise  every  event,  even  the  minutest  accident. 
And  when  we  further  and  particularly  consider  that  in 
the  apprehensive  vision  of  the  prophet  there  stood 
vividly  already  when  he  brought  forth  and  delivered 
the  denunciatory  discourses  of  chapters  II.  and  III,  the 
dread   and   blasting   scourge  of  Assyria's  great-power, 


Presages  of  a  Corning  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        41 

what  an  exceedingly  cruel  contrast  is  offered  in  them 
with  that  sparkling  peace  paragraph  at  the  head !  After 
listening  for  a  few  moments  to  these  few  luring  lines, 
the  Judean  hearers  must  have  been  suddenly  seized  with 
poignant  amazement  and  shaken  to  the  very  depth  of 
their  souls,  when  the  prophet  started  thence  upon  his 
opposite  line  of  denunciatory  declamations.  They  must 
have  thought  to  themselves  that  that  previous  glowing 
promise  was  but  a  hazy  apparition,  purposely  held  out 
to  vex  and  abash  them,  and  a  striking  travesty  rather 
than  a  quickening  reassurance.  For  there  could  be  no 
possible  rcconcilation  of  the  contrast,  created  by  those 
contrary  sentiments  in  their  minds. 

It  may  be  objected  that  the  prophet  had  not  spoken 
of  that  bright  and  happy  era  as  coming  immediately  or 
after  a  short  time,  but  had  chosen  the  indefinite  expres- 
sion of  "later  (or  "latter")  days,"  and  these  might  be 
far  off.  But,  we  must  reply,  had  the  hearers  really  con- 
strued those  words  of  big  promise  as  bearing  upon  the 
far  or  farther  future,  the  contrast  must  have  been  no  less 
sharp  and  chafing.  For,  they  must  have  reasoned,  what 
boots  it  that  suoh  glorious  and  blissful  times  will  be 
ahead  for  the  nation  as  such,  if  we,  the  present  genera- 
tion, are  doomed  to  severe,  even  ruinous  visitations? 

But  we  have  not  done  our  questioning.  There  lies 
another  grave  objection  against  that  initial  peace  para- 
graph, which  rises  unavoidably  as  we  are  to  estimate 
clearly  its  acceptibility  in  a  rational  view,  or  only  judge 
of  it  as  having  had  any  real  meaning  at  all.  We  ask, 
Who  of  the  Israelites  are  to  be  consistently  presumed 
to  have  been  told  that  they  would  enjoy  that  pretended 
glorious   future?     Surely,    not   the    wicked   part.     For 


42  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

they,  as  the  prophet  foreshows  in  his  denunciation, 
would  fall  a  prey  to  the  sword  of  the  invaders.  It  was 
only  the  just  that  would  be  spared  and  survive  (ch.  III. 
10).  They  were  the  "remnant"  assigned  for  salvation, 
and  they  with  their  posterity  would  be  deemed  worthy 
of  the  restoration  of  the  tutelary  relations  between 
Jehovah  and  Israel  (ch.  IV.  2-6).  N'ow  while,  in  the 
rigid  view  of  condign  Divine  recompense  as  maintained 
in  many  parts  of  Scripture, ^"^^  it  would  indeed  be  quite 
conceivable  to  attribute  to  the  prophet  the  intention  of 
particularizing  in  favor  of  the  smaller  portion  of  the 
Judeans — that  very  "remnant" — and  pronouncing  them 
alone  as  destined  to  share  in  the  prospective  Messianic 
bliss,  we  can  yet  not  bring  ourselves  to  ascribe  such 
exclusive  meaning  to  the  tenor  of  that  brilliant  forecast. 
Its  tone  is  altogether  too  general  and  generous  for  that. 
There  is,  considering  the  paragraph  in  itself,  such  a 
genuinely  and  broadly  national  scope  impressed 
on  it,  that  to  impute  to  it  any  partiality  for  the  righteous 
and  pious  minority  of  Israel  would  be  almost  preposter- 
ous. But  yet,  w'hen  we  view  it  logically  and  in  the 
context  of  the  whole  range  of  denunciations  contained 
in  the  before-noted  sequel,  there  is  nothing  left  for  us 
but  to  infer  that  the  prophet  meant  really  to  declare  the 
large,  part  of  Israel  shut  out  from  the  prospective  realm 
of  bliss. 

Yet  our  question  must  assume  a  still  more  striking- 
force  under  the  following  aspect.  Can  we  hold  it  for 
one  moment  consistent  with  the  national  self-conscious- 
ness or  lofty  patriotic  pride  of  the  prophet,  to  have  par- 
ticularized in  that  brilliant  forecast  in  favor  of  the  just 
"remnant"  of  Israel,  when  we  notice  him  at  the  same 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       •iS 

timo  to  have  foretold  that  "all  the  nations"  would  at  that 
g-lorions  eventuality  be  drawn  to  the  illustrious  centre  of 
peace-inspiring  theocracy,  Jerusalem?  (See  ch.  II.  2-4). 
Must  his  national  pride  not  have  forbidden  him  to  so 
discriminate  against  the  general  body  of  his  o^vn  people 
as  to  assign  the  enjoyment  of  the  future  blissful  era  to 
a  just  and  pious  remainder  only?  AVe  can  indeed  well 
conceive  and  reconcile  in  our  mind  that  an  Israelitish 
prophet  would  adjudge  to  converted  pagans  an  equality 
of  spiritual  advantage  with  his  own  nation.  This  is 
even  illustrated  in  Isa.  LVI.  1-8.  Yet  it  exceeds  our 
comprehension  that  a  national  Israelitish  preacher  should 
have  meant  to  award  to  pagan  converts  a  superiority 
of  divine  favor  above  any  part  of  Israel,  however 
grievous  their  backsliding  and  defection  from  their  God, 
and  however  severe  he  had  otherwise  to  be  in  his 
animadversion  of  their  wrongs.  ISTo,  such  insinuation 
must,  on  general  principles,  be  repulsed.  This  repulsion 
is,  in  very  fact,  fully  supported  by  the  view  above  noted, 
that  the  tone  of  that  peace  paragi-aph  is  alike  too  general 
and  generous  to  allow  of  its  discriminating  limitation 
to  a  just  "remnant."  But  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  this 
limitation  would  be  glaringly  established  in  view  of  the 
logical  and  contextual  conclusion  also  above  noticed. 

How  then,  let  us  ask,  must  those  luring  phrases  of 
a  coming  golden  era  of  peace  at  the  head  of  Isa.  ch.  II. 
impress  us?  Surely,  as  inconsistent,  not  only  with  the 
whole  context  but  also  with  itself — if  the  premise  of 
the  exclusion  of  the  majority  of  ill-deserted  Israel  from 
the  realm  of  bliss  holds,  as  it  logically  and  contextually 

must. 

This  positive  contextual  inconsistency  would  even 


44 


The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


practically  tempt,    nay   prompt   us   to   assume,    as    the 
inevitable    upshot    of    our    questioning,    that    Isaiah's 
famous  peace  paragraph  came  by  its  present  position 
through  some  literary  or  editorial  mischance.     Isaiah, 
we  readily  concede,  may  have  adopted  it  from  an  older 
source  for  use  at  some  public  oration.     But,  we  have  to 
say  emphatically  on  the  other  hand,  he  could  certainly 
not  have  spoken  it  in  the  same  strain  with  the  previous 
and  subsequent  context,  which  is  so  utterly  contrary  to 
it  in  texture  and  tendency.     Even  if  it  were  supposable 
that  he  spoke  it  nevertheless  in  the  connection  in  which 
it  is  found,   because  the  signature   of  "latter  day"   is 
attached    to    it    which    renders   the   prediction    but    as 
eventual,  yet  this  at  least  cannot  reasonably  be  gainsaid 
that  the  sharp  contrast  of  that  actual  juxtaposition  must 
have  sorely  jarred  the  ears  and  feelings  of  his  hearers. 
This  contrast  must  necessarily  have  made  of  no  avail 
the  whole  soothing  and  uplifting  purpose  he  might  have 
associated  with  it  in  his  mind.     Unless,  therefore,  we 
could  suspect  that  the  prophet  was  of  such  a  careless 
temper  as  to  jump  in  a  breath  from  the  one  extreme  of 
glowing  promise  of  bliss  to  the  other  of  terrible  and 
stunning  denunciation  of  divine  vengeance,  or  that  he 
was  so  unconcerned  about  the  order  of  his  own  writings 
as  that  in  collecting  them  he  took  no  heed  at  all  of  tlieir 
logical  consecution,  we  have  to  account  for  that  strangest 
of  all  juxtapositions  by  assigning  it  not  to  the  prophet 
himself,  but  to  a  later  transcriber  or  editor.  ^^^^     Such  a 
one,  in  the  simple  piety  and  regard  for  the  extant  com- 
positions of  the  gi-eat  and   renowned  prophet,   Isaiah, 
would  subordinate  every  sensible  concern  for  consistency 
to    the    reverent    motive    of    preserving    intact    every 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       -iS 

sentence  and  word  accredited  to  the  prophet,  for  the 
hereditary  sacred  possession  of  IsraeL  Thns  it  may  have 
come  that  he  placed  the  questionable  peace  paragTaph 
where  it  now  stands,  indifferent  to  the  simple  require- 
ment of  logical  arrangement  and  consecution,  and 
indifferent,  also,  to  the  future  charge,  by  more  critical 
readers,  of  his  most  uncritical  proceeding. 

This  .seems  the  only  alternative  by  which  we  could 
reduce  and  mitigate  the  objections,  which  stand  out 
against  that  celebrated  Isaianic  passage  of  brightest 
national  hope  for  the  futufe/^^^ 

Let  us  now  consider  the  almost  identical  Messianic 
peace  predictions  in  the  prophet  Micah,  ch.  IV.  1-4.  It 
will  disclose  to  us  the  same  enormous  incongruity  of 
context.  We  invite  attention  to  the  contrast  of  chapter 
III.  with  TV.  1-4.  In  the  former  place  the  prophet  had 
put  forth  the  most  scathing  reproof  of  his  countrymen 
for  their  various  iniquity.  In  the  last  verse,  12,  he 
denounced  in  punishment  of  it  the  most  direful  and 
startling  national  calamity:  "Therefore  shall  Zion  for 
your  sake  be  plowed  as  a  field,  and  Jerusalem  shall 
become  heaps  (viz.,  of  debris),  and  the  mountain  of  the 
house  as  the  high  places  of  the  forest."  The  denuncia- 
tion must  have  made  an  uncommonly  striking  and 
wounding  impression,  judging  from  the  reference  to  it 
in  Jeremiah  XXVI.  18  sq.  The  threat  that  the  wick- 
edness of  the  Judeans  had  brought  on  them  an 
impending  doom  of  the  total  destruction  and  annihi- 
lation of  Jerusalem  with  its  temple,  was  indeed  not 
accomplished.  Its  non-accomplishment  is  Providenti- 
ally accounted  for  in  Jeremiah  1.  c.  ver.  19.  But  this 
does  not  immediately  concern  us  here.    What  we  have  to 


46  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

urge,  and  urge  as  most  vexatious  and  utterly  incompre- 
hensible is,  tbat  immediately  upon  that  fatal  threat  the 
prophet  bursts  suddenly  forth  into  the  other  extreme  of 
the  golden  vision  of  an  elysian  future.  In  this  glowing- 
picture  Jerusalem  with  its  temple,  the  abode  of  Jehovah, 
passes  as  flourishingly  existent,  and  towards  this  sanctu- 
ary there  is,  as  the  presage  there  reads,  to  be  attracted 
the  whole  world  to  draw  from  it  instruction  for  guidance 
and  conduct;  also,  peace  would  be  universal,  and  Israel 
enjoy  blessed  security — the  very  consummation  of  peace 
in  their  traditional  conception  of  the  corresponding 
Hebrew  term.  There  occurs  in  the  whole  paragraph 
not  the  least  intimation  that  the  "latter  days'"  blissful 
condition  would  be  of  a  kind  that  might  be  construed 
as  compatible  with  that  paralyzing  close  of  chapter  III., 
namely,  that  it  would  ensue  after  the  catastrophe 
denounced  here.  The  prophet  strikes  in  those  initial 
lines  of  ch.  IV.  the  most  serene  notes  of  bright  hope- 
fulness, as  though  that  last  sentence  of  the  preceding 
chapter  with  its  dire  forecast  had  not  been  "written  or 
uttered  at  all.  Is  this  not  a  most  iiTeconcilable  con- 
trast? There  are  certainly  no  sharper  opposites  than 
penal  ruin  and  glorious  happiness.  Yet  these  are  placed 
in  Micah's  prophecies  close  upon  each  other!  That  a 
line  of  capitular  division  separates  them  in  form,  does 
not  in  the  least  alter  the  flagrant  contradiction  of  both 
those  utterances.  It  matters  nothing  that  they  are 
separated  by  such  outward  marks,  as  long  as  they  are 
proved  or  supposed  to  come  from  the  same  author  who 
apparently  gave  both  of  them  forth  in  all  earnest.  If 
he  did  at  both  times  mean  what  he  said — and  we  have 
certainly  no  right  to  suspect  that  he  was  trifling  with 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       47 

the  good  sense  and  good  faith  of  his  hearers  or  readers — 
we  must  at  least  cliarge  hiui  with  the  most  faulty 
memory,  which  would  not  serve  him  even  beyond  the 
vanished  breath  of  a  directly  preceding  sentence,  into 
the  immediately  following  one  of  another  chapter.  Yet 
as  this,  again,  would  be  too  curious  a  psychological 
phenomenon  to  be  seriously  entertained,  we  have  to  try 
to  lift  the  difficulty  of  their  irreconcilable  contrast  in  the 
same  manner  we  did  with  the  difficulty  offered  by  the 
kindred  peace  paragTaph  of  Isaiah:  that  is,  we  have  to 
declare  Micah's  peace  prediction,  too,  out  of  place  in  the 
context  in  which  it  is  found,  and  attribute  its  fixed 
incoi-poration  to  a  redactor  who  proceeded  thoughtlessly 
in  arranging  the  remaining  literary  productions  of  the 
prophet. 

The  latter  had  doubtless,  like  his  contemporary, 
Isaiah,  appropriated  and  assimilated  in  his  fond  soul  that 
glowing  picture  of  futurity  which  had  come  down  from 
an  anterior  period.  And  he,  like  this  contemporary^, 
had  unquestionably  cherished  it  for  some  oratorical 
purpose  of  captivating  the  ears  of  his  hearers,  which  he 
would  accomplish  at  a  time  when  they  would  be  deserv- 
ing of  a  bright  outlook  being  held  out  to  them.  But 
never,  we  aver,  could  either  prophet  have  uttered  that 
peace  paragraph  before  the  people,  when  he  was  in  the 
excited  mood  of  indigTiation,  which  prompted  him  to 
hurl  at  their  conscience  grave  charges  and  bitter 
denunciations,  such  as  are  found  in  the  last  verse  of 
chapter  III.  of  Mioah,  or  in  the  orations  of  Isaiah  from 
chapter  II.  to  lY. 

ISTor  could  such  brilliant  peace  predictions  ever  have 
counterbalanced  the  hard  and  heavy  realities  of  unrest. 


48  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

tumult  and  struggle  with  which  the  life  of  the  nation 
of  Israel  was  beset  in  those  ancient  prophetic  times. 
They  were,  strictly  viewed,  no  more  than  thin  gossamers 
floating  in  the  air,  doing  at  best  the  momentary  good  of 
soothing  the  people's  hearts,  which  smarted  alike  from 
oppressive  outward  conditions  and  the  stings  of  moni- 
tions and  rebukes  with  which  the  same  prophets  treated 
them  again  and  again. 

We  see,  then,  how  frail  the  mere  literal  and  logical 
foundation  of  those  almost  identical  peace  paragraphs 
of  Isaiah  and  Micah  is.  When  we  hold  yet  in  mind  the 
irrepressible  rational  judgment,  that  all  such  bright  fore- 
casts of  bliss  and  glory  were  in  their  nature  nothing  but 
a  fabric  of  fancy,  sweet  at  the  moment  of  their 
conception  and  utterance,  but  bitter  in  the  sequence,  as 
the  indefinitely  long  delayed  realization  must  have  sorely 
harassed  the  hearts  of  those  to  whom  they  were 
addressed,  we  have  to  insist  that  their  merit  of 
temporarily  counteracting  the  popular  depression 
of  spirit  must  have  been  very  precarious  indeed. 
The  present  evil  and  the  fear  of  equally  hard 
or  still  worse  impending  evil  was,  we  have 
to  judge,  too  heavy  a  weight  on  their  minds  to  allow 
them  to  be  carried  away  with  the  prophets'  ow^n  actual 
or  ostensible  enthusiasm.*  And  it  is  this  circum- 
stance, too,  that  forbids  us  rating  those  peace  predictions 
too  high,  or  resorting  to  them  in  any  serious  manner,  and 
especially  attaching  to  them  any  dogmatic  importance 
for  those  times  or  any  other  time. 

Dogmatism,  that  is,  the  positive  religious-like 
assumption  based  on  those  prophetic  messages,  that  a 

*See  Excursus. 


Presages  of  a  Comhuj  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       49 

Messianic  peace  reign  to  come  was  or  is  part  of  God's 
pro^'iclential  design  for  the  farther  future,  must,  on  the 
Avhole,  recede  with  abashment  before  the  stern  fact  of 
their  becoming  meaningless  by  the  mere  contextual 
relations  in  which  they  stand  in  either  Isaiah  or  Micah. 
^or  will  an}^  rational  reader  contend  that  a  prophet 
could,  because  of  his  exalted  state  of  mind,  have  also 
exalted  himself  above  the  ordinary  prerequisite  of 
straight  logic.  A  prophet,  like  Micah,  for  instance,  no 
more  than  any  other  human  being,  could  sensibly  defy 
the  cogent  argument  that  the  denunciation  of  ch.  III. 
12,  and  the  promise  of  IV.  1-4,  are  irreconcilable 
opposites,  mutually  exclusive  and  never  tractable 
enough  to  be  made  to  join  hands.  Only  one  of  those 
opposite  propositions  could  be  thought  as  real  or  capable 
of  being  realized. 

Close  and  critical  examination,  then,  brings  out 
clearly  and  irrefutably  the  circumstance,  that  those 
Messianic  peace  forecasts  not  only  partake  of  the 
suspended  nature  of  any  promise  resting  on  no  founda- 
tion presently  justifying  it,  but  show,  besides,  a  glaring 
unreality  in  the  very  contexts  in  wdiich  they  appear. 

Still  more  striking  instances  of  the  problematic 
character  and  suspense  adherent  to  those  peace  presages 
for  nearer  or  farther-ofP  times,  we  have  to  produce. 
"\Ve  shall  now  deal  with  direct  announcements  of  an 
expected  personal  (Messianic)  ruler.  By  the  way 
of  anticipation  we  will  state  at  once  as  the  result  of  this 
inquiry,  that  the  concept  of  prosperous  futurity  to  be 
construed  from  them  can  be  none  other  than  'through 
bloody  war  to  sweet  Messianic  peace.' 

4 


50  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

We  will  refer  first  to  Micali  ch.  V.  The  feature  of 
the  golden  age  to  come,  in  which  all  nations  would  quit 
warring  and  peace  would  universally  dominate,  so 
charmingly  presented  in  ch.  IV.  3,  receives  additional 
exultant  illustration  in  the  promise  of  the  rise  of  an 
illustrious  king  in  that  next  chapter.  Of  this  predicted 
ideal  monarch  we  have  already  treated  above.  He  is 
portrayed  as  of  egregious  sway  and  as  the  very  incarna- 
tion of  peace  in  the  intense  and  extensive  meaning  of  the 
equivalent  Hebrew  word  "shalom,"  especially  as  to  its 
combined  implication  of  abiding  national  and  individual 
happiness.  But  this,  we  must  say,  is  only  a  glaring 
veneer  covering  over  stark  realities  and  gloomy  con- 
ditions, for  a  momentary  end  of  captivating  and  sooth- 
ing the  hearers.  That  lustrous  "consummation  devoutly 
to  be  wished"  must  to  the  practical  and  cool  observer 
of  the  political  complexion  of  the  Jewish  State  as  it 
then  was,  have  seemed  far  and  possibly  farther  distant 
than  ever  before. 

The  prophet  himself  who  painted  that  brilliant 
picture  of  futurity  could  not  suppress  the  jarring  sftrokes 
of  exceeding  difficulty  to  be  overcome  antecedently  to 
that  happy  eventuality.  These  were,  that  the  potent 
future  peace-king  would  have  plenty  of  bloody  work  to 
do  to  beat  back  and  defeat  hostile  invaders.  The 
possibility,  in  particular,  of  new  warlike  attempts  upon 
the  Jewish  land  by  the  much  dreaded,  all-conquering 
great-power,  Assyria,  mth  her  "army  which  was  always 
on  a  war  footing"  (so  Maspero,  'Struggles  of  the 
ISTations',  p.  620),  looms  up  fatally  from  the  background. 
The  apprehension  of  a  new  Assyrian  invasion,  advanced 
in  ch.  V.  verses  4,  5,  puts  a  strongly  disilluding  damper 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       51 

upon  the  whole  bright  and  fascinating  Messianic  vision. 
All  the  God-given  gTeatness  and  power  of  the  prospective 
Messiah  did  not  preclude,  even  in  the  prophet's  o^^^l 
exalted  mind  and  speech,  such  fatal  chances  over- 
hanging the  nation's  horizon.  In  fact,  the  golden  state 
of  final  disarmament  of  Israel,  so  gracefully  depicted  in 
ch.  V.  vv.  9,  10,  could,  by  the  prophet's  own  implied 
admission,  not  be  realized  until  previously,  with  lion- 
like  force  and  ferocity,  the  overpowering  hand  of  Israel 
would  have  subdued  and  destroyed  all  their  enemies  (see 
w.  7,  8),  and  this  with  the  miraculous  aid  of  Jehovah, 
as  the  Hebrew  word  "yikkarethu"  used  in  v.  9,  seems  to 
indicate  . 

This  shows  conclusively  enough  that  neither  was 
the  outlook  at  the  time  of  those  prophetic  utterances 
propitious  enough  for  a  realization  of  the  glorious 
Messianic  peace-empire,  nor  could  the  prophet  himself 
in  his  clear  and  collected  thought  have  consistently  con- 
ceived of  any  realization  of  it,  before  the  manifold 
oppressive  and  ruinous  power  of  Israel's  foes  was  entirely 
undone.  What  stuj^endous  and  heroic  warlike  measures 
and  enterprises  would  be  required  to  accomplish  this  end, 
no  sensible  prophet  of  the  eighth  century  B.  C,  which 
was  so  very  calamitous  for  all  Israel,could  have  concealed 
in  his  own  mind.  Neither  a  Zechariah,  nor  an  Isaiah, 
nor  a  Micah,  who  were  contemporary  witnesses  of  that 
convulsive  period  in  Israel's  history,  could  reasonably 
shut  his  eyes  to  the  fierce  menace  to  wliich  the  Jew^ish 
land  was  then  incessantly  exposed.  If  they  nevertheless 
came  before  the  people  with  their  bright  promises  of  a 
marvelously  happy  and  glorious  future,  they  acted 
mainly,  as  already  repeatedly  suggested,  from  a  motive 


62  The  Clirisimas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

of  svmiDatliy  with  their  doAvncast  and  despairing-  com- 
patriots, stimulating  their  courage  to  bear  up  under  the 
visitations  and  steeling  them  for  as  much  resistance  as 
they  could  muster. 

They  were  also,  doubtless,  themselves  enthusiasts, 
bred  and  imbued  with  the  then  already  traditionary 
notion  of  a  halcyon  era  to  come  to  Israel,  which  lifted 
their  own  minds  above  the  stress  and  distress  of  the 
actual  wretched  conditions  of  the  nation.  The  first 
bright  ray  of  light  and  relief  from  foreign  oppression, 
the  first  calm,  untroubled  hours  after  a  long  and  hard 
tumult  of  national  anxiety,  were  enough  to  stir  their 
own  hearts  again  with  the  high  national  hopes  of  the 
past.  Fancy  w^ould  then  promptly  step  in,  "flinging 
for  them  an  airy  bridge"  across  the  present  chasm,  and 
thromng  its  connecting  spans  out  and  back  into  the 
reign  of  David,  the  palmy  days  of  which  passed  in 
tradition  as  excelling  in  true  prosperity  any  other  period 
in  the  national  history.  What  was,  they  would 
imagine,  could,  under  God,  be  again.  Jehovah  might 
let  rise  again  a  mighty  and  illustrious  Davidide,  who 
Avould  marvelously  fill  the  present  chasm  with  his  and 
the  nation's  power  and  glory.  It  is,  there  is  good 
reason  to  suppose,  ^in  those  temporary  lulls  of  foreign 
menace  or  aggression  that  there  may  be  discovered 
the  origin  of  most,  if  not  all  the  gorgeous  predictions 
of  peace,  security,  splendor  and  might,  which  came 
from  their  high-flown  minds  and  inflated  lips.  "We 
will  make  this  view  most  plausible  by  a  reference  to 
the  very  significant  and  notorious  prophecies  written 
or  delivered  immediately  or  soon  after  king  Hezekiah's 
accession.     This  we  attempt  to  do  in  the  separate  Excur- 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       53 

siis.  Here  we  aim  to  furtlier  show  with  convincing 
force  that  the  predictions  of  a  coming  glorious  peace  era 
littered  by  the  prophets  of  the  Assyrian  epoch,  could 
mean  only,  if  they  were  to  mean  anything  at  all,  the 
attainment  of  peace,  after  wading  first  through  vast 
streams  of  blood  shed  in  terribly  destructive  warfare. 

Let  us  look  at  the  remarkable  passage  of  Isaiah 
XI.  1-10.  It  is  like  the  previously  noted  one  of  Micah, 
a  typical  Messianic  forecast.  And  it  is,  too,  of  the 
same  tyi^e  with  it  in  the  prediction  of  a  God-endowed 
Davidic  ruler  to  come  (compare  Micah  V.  3  with  Isa. 
XI.  2),  only  more  elaborate  in  the  description  of  his 
qualities  and  the  blessed  efficiency  of  his  dominion. 
That  it  is  organically  connected  with  ch.  IX.  5,  7,  is 
to  us  open  to  no  question.  This  point  of  view  we  have 
marked  already  above  (note  21).  It  deserves,  indeed, 
an  ever  newly  reiterated  assertion,  in  the  face  of  the 
apparently  never  ending  mysticism  in  which  it  is,  in 
some  of  its  parts  at  least,  so  persistently  folded  up  for 
the  purpose  of  a  one-sided  dogmatic  scheme. 

The  oracle  of  ch.  XI  sets  off  the  coming  ruler's 
chief  trait  of  character  as  that  of  consummate  righteous- 
ness— the  basal  condition,  indeed,  of  any  government's 
peaceful  and  prosperous  progTcss.^'^^  Profound  peace 
will  prevail  under  him  (compare  also  IX,  5,  6),  both 
by  his  own  disposition  and  the  dispensation  of  Jehovah, 
who  will  cause  even  the  noxious  beasts  to  lose  their 
ferocious  bent  and  become  tame  and  mild  towards  the 
rest  of  the  animals  (verses  6-0). ^^'>  He  will  be  the 
central  banner  towards  which  all  peoples  will  tend  in 
homage   and  adoration:     thus  eminent  and  illustrious 


54  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Avill  be  the  coming  Jerusalemite  Messiali  and  world- 
ruler. 

Yet  soon  tlie  propliet  tones  doAvn  again  liis  over- 
drawn strains  of  promise.  As  tliougli  lie  had  suddenly 
awaked  from  a  teasing  and  abortive  dream,  he  reflects 
again  upon  the  sordid  and  sorrowful  realities  and  dangers 
that  actually  subsisted,  contravening  the  brilliant  out- 
look he  had  so  blandishingly  held  out  to  his  hearers. 
As  though  the  previous  happy  prediction  had  not  at  all 
been  made,  he  reasons  again  in  an  anxious  and  warlike 
tone.  His  grandiose  oracle  having  spent  its  dazzling 
sparkles,  he  falls  back  again  upon  the  actual  dreary 
present  with  its  various  perils  threatening  the  nation. 

When  he  in  the  sequel,  vv.  11-13,  predicts  a 
re-gathering  of  all  the  exiled  Israelites  from  the  four 
ends  of  the  earth,  ^^^^  to  be  firmly  cemented  together 
again  as  one,  undivided  nation,  and  thus  unitedly  to 
enjoy  the  blissful  government  of  the  God-endowed 
Anointed,  we  are  fain  to  expect  the  illustration  drawn 
out  subsequently,  that  then  all  those  returned  and 
brotherly  confederate  masses  of  Israel  would  have  to 
do  nothing  but  indulge  the  sweet  consciousness  of 
re-acquired  national  bliss,  and,  in  the  proud  feeling  of 
themselves,  look  on  self-complacently  how  other 
nationalities  would  come  and  offer  allegiance  to  their 
Anointed  and  approach  them,  the  newly  elevated,  great 
and  commanding  nation,  in  a  submissive  attitude, 
craving  suppliantly  their  favor  and  good- will.  But  no; 
this  would  not  ensue.  At  any  rate,  the  prophet  has  not 
opened  such  perspective.  What  he  practically  indi- 
cates is,  that  the  Messianic-'theocratically  united  Israel 
would  then  stand  shoulder  to  shoulder — to  engage  in 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        55 

the  bloody  business  of  war.  The  previously  pictured 
universal  peace  was  therefore  but  an  airy  hypothesis. 
It  meant  at  best,  as  to  Israel,  an  armed  peace — such  as 
European  nations  present  yet  in  our  day — a  peace 
resting-  on  and  combined  with  the  alleged  illimitable 
and  insuperable  power  of  the  Messianic  king,  (compare 
IX.  6).  By  this  combination  would,  on  the  one  hand, 
Israel's  enemies  be  held  in  awful  check  and,  on  the  other, 
Israel  themselves  be  enabled  to  take  dire  vengeance 
on  and  make  bloody  conquest  of  the  various  Palestinian 
nationalities,  wdio  were  of  an  ever  hostile  temperament 
and  attitude  against  them.  If  the  Israelitish  hearer 
or  reader  of  those  sweet  delineations  of  promise,  in  vv. 
1-10,  was  rocked  into  the  happy  dream  that  with  the 
arrival  of  the  ideal  ruler  all  would  be  peace  and  rest, 
he  was  suddenly  shaken  out  of  it  again  by  the  picture  of 
the  stern  eventuality  of  having  to  reduce  by  warlike 
enterprises  the  different  hateful  neighboring  national- 
ities. Surely,  Israel  under  those  imagined  ideal 
conditions  would  easily  be  able  to  cope  with  them. 
Yet  the  prospect  of  bloody  warfare  can  never  leave 
any,  even  the  most  powerful  nation,  in  a  calm  and 
unruffled  mood  of  mind. 

The  prophet  holds  out  that  those  rejoined  masses  of 
Israel  would  under  the  leadership  of  their  august  Mes- 
sianic monarch  "fly  upon  the  shoulders  of  the  Philistines, 
spoil  all  the  children  of  the  east,  lay  their  hand  upon 
Edoni  and  Moab,  and  the  children  of  Amnion  shall  be 
reduced  to  dependence"  (v.  14).^^^^  Even  the  miracu- 
lously striking  "rod  of  mouth  and  breath  of  lip"  of  the 
Messiah  will  not  suffice  to  subdue  and  conquer  those 
nationalities.      He  will  not  only  be  "girded  with  right- 


56  Tlie  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Proplietic 

eousness,"  but  will  have  eventually  to  gird  on  his  real 
sword  and  don  the  rest  of  his  steel  annor,  to  lead  on  his 
Israelitish  troops  in  bloody  assaults  upon  tliese  nation- 
alities— ^a  fierce  warrior,  again,  instead  of  a  gentle  peace 
ruler.  How  can  this  latter  statement,  we  ask,  be  made 
to  accord  with  the  previous  lines,  also  with  eh.  IX.  6, 
and  especially  with  ch.  IT.  1-4,  predictive  of  universal 
peace? 

Delitzsch,  too,  in  his  commentary  in  loco,  makes 
the  same  kind  of  observation.  He  says:  "But  how 
does  this  warlike  outlook  tally  with  the  preceding 
promise  of  a  paradisean  peace,  which  presupposes  an 
entire  cessation  of  war,  as  foreshadowed  in  Isa.  ch. 
II.  4?  It  is  a  contradiction  which  can  be  solved  only 
from  the  point  of  view  that  the  contents  of  ver.  14  are 
only  images  taken  from  the  warlike  present,  but  typi- 
fying the  future  dominion  of  united  Israel  over  the 
neighboring  nations  by  means  of  spiritual  weapons." 
!N"ow,  we  contend  against  that  most  learned  exegetist, 
this  shift  of  declaring  as  typical  what  cannot  stand  the 
test  as  a  real  and  literal  representation,  meets  in  the 
present  days  of  rational  and  critical  interpretation  of 
Scripture  certainly  with  but  few  adherents.  We  at 
any  rate  repel  as  the  most  daring  venture  and  dubious 
dealing  with  old  sacred  texts,  any  such  attempt  at 
symbolizing  relative  expressions  in  instances  which 
show  on  their  face  and  from  all  internal  reasons  that 
they  can  bear  a  literal  meaning  only.  We  freely  admit 
that  the  old  prophets  used  at  times,  and  at  times 
rather  prominently,  a  figiirative  language.  But,  we 
hold,  there  are  but  few  cases  in  which  the  intention 
of  the   respective   "\mter  can,    to   a   scholar  versed   in 


Presages  of  a  Cnuii)if/  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        57 

the  whole  Bible,  remain  doubtful.  He  will  generally 
almost  imfailingly  be  able  to  make  out  from  the 
tenor  and  drift  of  the  composition,  whether  the 
^Arriter  thought  to  convey  a  literal  or  figurative  sense. 
In  the  case  in  point  v\^e  would  vouch  for  and  stake 
our  reputation  for  knowledg-e  on  the  proposition, 
that  Isaiah  never  meant  there  aught  but  to  advance 
to  his  Israeli  tish  hearers  the  relieving  prospect, 
that  in  the  times  of  Messiah  those  hateful  neighboring 
nationalities  would  be  coped  with  in  regular  warlike 
fashion,  with  bow  and  spear  and  other  material  weapons 
of  destruction,  should  they  further  undertake,  as  they 
so  often  did  before,  to  molest  and  make  havoc  among 
Israel.  The  terms  used  in  ver.  14  are  those  of  actual 
warlike  assaults  upon  insidious  Palestinian  foes,  and 
nothing  else.  Nor  has  the  prophet  intimated  with  one 
word  or  in  any  manner  imaginable,  that  in  the  blessed 
farther  future  the  people  of  Israel  would  handle 
"spiritual  weapons."  The  Messianic  king  himself  is, 
truly,  pictured  as  spiritually  gifted,  and  to  an  almost 
supernal  degree.  But  as  to  the  mass  of  Israel  we  can 
find  no  trace  in  the  whole  context  of  that  passage  that 
the  prophet  wished  to  foreshadow  them,  too,  as  thus 
gifted,  so  that  they  might,  as  Delitzsch  would  have  it, 
smite  the  pagan  Palestinians  with  their  superior  spirit- 
ual weapons.  ISTot  that  it  is  foreign  to  an  old  prophet  to 
predict  the  eschatological  spectacle  of  intense,  even 
supernatural  enlightenment  among  the  multitude  of 
Israel.  Xo,  such  an  instance  is  really  offered  in  the 
prophet  Joel  (ch.  III.  1  sq).  Even  passages  like  Isa. 
LIX.  21,  may  allow  of  such  an  over-^vTought  construc- 
tion    (Ibn     Ezra     at     least     puts     such     construction 


58  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

upon  the  last-cited  passage).  But  this  cannot  off- 
set the  real  textual  and  contextual  sense  of  the 
prophecy  in  point.  Here  material  weapons  only  could 
be  meant.  The  Philistines  and  Edomites,  Israel's  arch- 
enemies, would  care  very  little  for  the  eventuality  of  the 
Israelites  possessing  a  high  spirit,  even  a  prophetical 
temper.  They  would  continue  to  defy  the  spirit,  and 
mock  at  the  supposed  prophets,  as  they  were  wont  to 
do  formerly,  and  inflict  all  possible  mischief  upon  Israel 
in  the  future  as  they  did  in  the  past,  unless  a  miracle 
should  prevent  their  doing  so.  By  a  miracle,  indeed, 
Jehovah  could  curb  and  restrain  the  violence  aimed  by 
those  foes  at  his  people.  But  then  the  miracle  would 
be  directly  God's  and  not  his  people's. 

We,  for  our  part,  can  find  a  solution  of  that  contra- 
diction— and  one  for  which  we  claim  by  no  means  any 
merit  of  indisputability — only  in  either  of  the  two  fol- 
lowing suppositions.  We  may  uphold  the  theory  of 
Fiirst,  mentioned  above,  that  the  first  ten  verses  of 
Isaiah  XL  were  also,  like  ch.  IX.  1-6,  borro^ved  from 
an  older  prophet.  Isaiah  may  accordingly  be  supposed 
to  have  incorporated  those  verses  here  to  make  up  an 
oration  for  a  certain  purpose.  And  it  may  have  been, 
further,  that  in  the  process  of  welding  the  matter 
together,  the  logical  gap  thus  created  was  simply  blurred 
over.  Or  the  contradiction  may  be  solved  in  this  man- 
ner, and  agreeably  with  our  position,  that  none  of  those 
bland  and  sweet  Messianic  presages  of  the  prophets  are 
to  be  taken  strictly  in  their  literal  import.  They  were 
substantially  no  more  than  flashes  of  poetic  fancy, 
flashes  focused  and  conserved  that  they  might  occasion- 
ally irradiate  and  solace  downcast  hearts,  and  therefore 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        59 

never  to  be  judged  of  according  to  standards  of  truth 
or  religion;  or,  if  they  came  from  the  somewhat  con- 
vinced hearts  of  the  prophets  and  were  to  pass  in  a 
literal  sense,  they  could  certainly  have  implied  nothing 
but  that  the  ultimate  era  which  Avas  to  dawn  and  break 
for  Israel  would  be  achieved  only  after  having  first 
disposed  summarily  of  all  hostile  nationalities  from 
whom  attacks  were  constantly  feared. 

This  view  is  best  instanced  by  the  above-quoted 
passage  of  Micali  ch.  V.  7-10,  which  may  really  be 
regarded  as  a  foremost  illustrative  specimen  marking 
out  the  intrinsic  merit  of  all  other  kindred  prophetic 
uMcrfinces  as  well.  In  that  passage  the  real  and  endur- 
ing peace-footing  of  the  nation  of  Israel  is  manifestly 
enough  prefigured  as  to  take  place  no  earlier  than 
the  time  when  they  would  utterly  have  vanquished 
and  prostrated  their  various,  ever  menacing  foes. 
This  time,  freely  we  say  it,  never  came,  and  never  could 
come,  considering  the  unfortunate  geographical  and 
numerical  conditions  in  which  Providence  placed  that 
nation. 

We  see,  then,  that  Isaiah,  too,  cannot  be  understood 
but  as  conceiving  the  fond  traditionary  notion  of  a 
future  golden  era  of  peace,  to  be  other  than  the  issue  of 
an  all  around  subjugating,  sanguinary  warfare  against 
those  peoples  who  were  and  would  be  ever  ready  to  break 
in  turbulently  upon  the  even  course  of  Isra'cl's  calm  and 
prosperous  state.  This  would  be  virtually  equal  to  the 
proposition — impossible  almost  of  expression — through 
incessant  icar  to  lasting  peace.  This  being  so,  abiding 
peace  could  not  possibly  be  predicted  in  all  earnestness 
and    according    to    facts    which    universal    human    his- 


60  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

tory  supplies.  Eveiy  day  miglit  bring  to  Israel  new 
complications  and  disturbances.  How,  then,  could  sucli 
blissful  consummation  be  presaged  in  advance,  and  in 
particular  for  the  whole  length  of  the  future  time  of  the 
princes  of  the  Davidic  line,  which  was  to  re-open  again 
with  the  'Messiah'  and  be  peipetuated  in  the  unbroken 
succession  of  these  illustrious  rulers?  Again,  could  any 
prophet  know  beforehand  even  so  much  as  that  the 
Messiah's  own  presumptive  heir  and  successor  would 
be  held  worthy  enough  in  the  sight  of  God  to  really 
follow  his  father  on  the  throne  and  body  forth  the 
theocratic  idea  and  cause  in  the  imagined  Jerusalemite 
center  of  the  divine  vicegerency?  The  prophets,  as  it 
seems  to  result  from  different  Scriptural  indications, 
truly  flattered  themselves  with  such  fond  hope.  Yet 
they  could,  on  the  other  hand,  nowise  be  certain  about 
its  accomplishment,  nor  be  warranted  in  speaking  of  it 
in  positive  tones  of  necessary  fulfillment.  Unless  it 
could  be  imagined  that  any  one  prophet  held  the 
curious,  vain  notion  that  the  hoped-for  Messiah  was 
immortal^*°^  and  would  reign  for  ever,  we  have  to 
declare  that  none  of  them  was  able  to  predict  lasting 
peace  and  prosperity  for  Israel  in  the  supposed 
Messianic  era  to  come.  For  while  the  illustrious 
coming  shepherd  of  Israel  might  indeed  succeed  in 
establishing  an  exemplary  government  of  surpassing 
justice,  and  signal,  enviable  happiness  among  the  nation, 
there  was  yet  no  guaranty  that  this  blessed  state  would 
unbrokenly  endure  even  under  him,  much  less  that  it 
would  safely  and  unfailingly  attend  all  the  coming 
governments  of  his  Messianic  successors. 

Now  we  must  not  be  too  critical  on  points  like  these. 


Presages  of  a  Coining  Golden  Era  of  Peace.        61 

AVe  oTig'lit  to,  and  we  readily  do,  allow  for  the  prophet's 
emotional  conditions  into  wdiich  we  of  a  late  generation, 
and  perhaps  too  sober  habits  of  mind,  can  no  more  put 
ourselves.  Further,  those  mellow  and  fascinating  peace 
predictions  were,  on  the  one  hand,  but  rehearsals  of  tra- 
ditionary notions,  and,  on  the  other,  designed  to  relieve 
and  soften  the  effect  of  the  sharp  rebukes  which 
those  ancient  preachers  of  Israel  were  nrompted  to  deal 
to  their  people.  To  offset  the  smart  of  their 
rebukes,  the  other  extreme  of  picturing  their  future  in 
most  roseate  colors,  if  they  should  repent  and  return  to 
the  pure  service  of  God  and  to  righteousness,  was 
resorted  to.  All  this  was  an  emotional  proceeding 
merely.  It  rested  not  on  a  condition  full  of  such  high 
promise  for  the  future  and  justifying  the  forecast. 

Both  extremes  just  noted  are  strikingly  illustrated 
in  the  prophet  Hosea.  He  lived  in  the  early 
part  of  the  eighth  century  and  witnessed  the  terri- 
ble and  coi-rupt  state  of  tlie  northern  kingdom, 
his  own  native  land.  He  poured  out  his  righteous 
indignation  unsparingly  and  with  scathing  threats  of 
utter  ruin  and  desolation  of  country  and  people.  Yet 
almost  in  the  same  strain  which  dealt  tke  heaviest  blow 
of  reproof  to  his  countrymen,  he  predicted  that,  if  they 
would  bethink  themselves  and  repent,  they  would  be 
re-accepted  into  Grod's  favor,  and  as  a  result  of  it  God 
would  make  an  end  of  the  hurtful  beasts,  of  war  and  its 
baneful  instruments,  and  let  them  live  in  security — 
peace,  indeed — and  the  enjoyment  of  plenty.  See 
Hosea  II.  16-25. 

There  is  certainly  no  cogent  conclusion  from  such 
extravagant    orations     that    the    prophets    themselves 


62  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

believed  religiouslj  in  tlie  advent  of  a  golden  future  of 
peace,  much  as  tliey  had  themselves  imbibed  the 
tradition  of  its  expected  coming  and  doubtless  indulged, 
from  a  patriotic  and  sympathetic  feeling,  such  expecta- 
tion with  all  the  rest  of  the  people.  At  best,  the 
promises  of  such  glorious  consummation  rested  but  on 
emotional  grounds.  They  were  not  substantial  enough 
to  be  accoimted  as  involving  the  probability  of  realiza- 
tion. Unfortunate  realities  might  at  any  coming 
moment  belie  the  promise  and  thwart  the  realization. 
However  this  may  be,  and  in  what  manner  soever  we 
may  judge  of  the  prophetic  predictions  of  an  ulterior  or 
ultimate  era  of  peace,  this  much  can  never  be  disputed, 
that  they  could  not  mean  aught  but  to  point  to  an 
eventuality  ensuing  after  intense  and  immense  warlike 
struggles.  This  results  inconteetably  from  internal 
evidences,  laid  open  by  a  clear  investigation  of  the 
respective  prophetic  texts  and  contexts. 

And  this  was,  too,  let  us  add  in  conclusion,  the  inter- 
pretation which  later  apocalyptic  and  apocryphal  Mess- 
ianic writers  put  on  those  predictions.  One  of  those 
writers,  upon  whom  the  spirit  of  the  old  prophecies 
seems  tr  have  been  breathed  most  genuinely  and 
freshly,  the  author  of  the  apocryphal  Psalms  of  Solomon, 
composed  after  Pompey's  conquest  of  Judea,  about  the 
middle  of  the  first  century  B.  C,  reasons  in  this  strain. 
The  expected  "Messiah,  the  son  of  David,"  will  enter 
upon  his  dominion  of  power,  peace  and  prosperity,  after 
having  destroyed  the  heathen  invaders  of  Jerusalem 
(and  the  Jewish  land)  and  smitten  Israel's  foes  with  the 
awe  of  his  dread  sway,  so  that  they  would  no  more 
attempt  any  hostility  against  his  nation  (Ps.   XVII). 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       63 

He  will  indeed  not  be  a  warlike  ruler  (ibid,  ver,  37).  His 
true  force  will  consist  in  his  implicit  trust  in  almiglity 
God,  who  is  ever  able  to  keep  Israel's  enemies  in  check, 
if  he  choose  to  do  so.  Yet  for  all  that,  the  "iron 
scepter"  cannot  be  spared  wherewith  he  would  cast  down 
and  "shatter"  Israel's  foes  (ver.  26).  Their  forcible 
reduction,  in  order  to  render  them  permanently  innoc- 
uous, is  here  necessarily  presumed.  Truly,  again,  that 
Psalmist  holds  firmly,  though  not  expressly,  to  the 
expectation  that  war  will,  with  the  strong  establishment 
of  the  Messiah's  empire,  cease  forever.  Yet  in  order 
that  such  high  end  of  stable  peace  and  security  be 
attained,  previous  sweeping  martial  enterprises  are 
indispensable — as  we  have  to  judge  from  the  whole  tenoi* 
of  the  psalm  to  have  been  the  writer's  supposition.  It 
is  only  when  the  Messiah  will  practically  be  possessed  of 
almightiness,  that  he  will  overawe  and  terrorize  the 
enemies  of  Israel  with  the  "word  of  his  mouth"  (w. 
27,  39;  and  this  doubtless  in  accommodation  to  Isa. 
XL  4). 

The  Sibylline  Oracles,  too,  holding  out  an  era  of 
peaceful  and  prosperous  univei'sal  theocracy  to  be, 
cannot  get  away  from  the  notion  that  war  is  to  precede 
that  blessed  ultimate  state.  In  the  famous  passage, 
III.  652  sq.,  the  prospective  saintly  and  heroic  lord  is 
said  to  "make  the  whole  earth  cease  from  evil  war,  killing 
some  and  accomplishing  faithful  covenants  to  others." 
This  shows  conclusively  that  even  this  writer  of  glowing 
promise  for  the  future  could  not  perceive  the  golden  era 
of  universal  peace  and  good-will  under  the  Zionite 
theocracy  as  other  than  preceded  by  the  violence  of 
destructive  war.     Xay,  even  further  onsets  against  the 


64 


The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


Jewish  land  are,  despite  the  presumption  of  a  coming 
theocratic  peace  government,  anticipated  there  (see  663- 
697).  God,  it  is  foretokl,  will  deal  with  those  furious 
enemies  of  Israel  by  "war  and  the  sword,"  amidst  other 
ruinous  physical  catastrophes.  It  is  only  afterwards 
that  "the  children  of  God  will  live  in  rest  and  peace, 
the  hand  of  the  Holy  One  protecting  them"  (698-709): 
even  the  era  of  universal  peace  will  then  have  begun 
(743-760). 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       65 


NOTES. 


(1).  We  aim  to  make  it  clear  by  the  following- 
reference  to  the  gospel  account  of  Jesus'  triumphal 
entry  into  Jerusalem.  That  the  multitude  acclaiming 
Jesus  on  that  occasion  should  have  shouted  before  him 
"Hosanna,"  and  also  "Blessed  is  he  that  cometh  in  the 
name  of  the  Lord"  (Matt.  XXL  9),  is  in  itself  indeed 
credible  enough.  The  latter  sentence  is  extracted  from 
Ps.  CXVIII.  26,  in  which  verse  it  constitutes  a  clause. 
The  former  expression  is  readily  discerned  to  have  also 
been  taken  from  that  context,  viz.,  v.  25.  Yet.  we  have 
\o  say,  it  does  not  occur  there  in  such  apocopate  and  con- 
tracted form.  There  is,  moreover,  no  Scriptural  evi- 
dence that  even  in  its  longer  structure  it  ever  served  as 
aught  but  an  invocation  of  the  Deity.  (Alford,  in  loco, 
observes  that  "Hosanna"  was  "a  formula  originally  of 
supplication,  but  conventionally  of  gratulation."  But 
he  fails  to  quote  any  external  source  from  which  he 
could  have  derived  the  latter  assertion.  For  aught  we 
know,  it  would  be  most  difficult,  nay  impossible  to  bring 
such  support).  But  for  all  that  we  hold  it  possible  that 
it  w^as  already  in  the  days  of  Jesus  vulgarly  employed  in 
that  shorter  form  in  which  we  see  it  practically  used  in 
the  account  of  Jesus'  triumphal  entry.  We  know  that 
the  medieval  Rabbinism  adopted  "hoshana"  as  a  technical 

5 


^6  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

designation  of  tlie  ritualistic  willows  of  the  seventh  day 
of  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles,  and  even  as  a  particular 
name  of  this  day  itself,  which  was  the  "great  hoshana." 
It  is  therefore  not  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  that 
popular   contraction    of  the  phrase   had  already   been 
accomplished  in  Jesus'  time,  and  been  used  freely  for  the 
same  ceremonial  denotations.     From  the  use  in  connec- 
tion with  ceremonial  objects  it  may  have  been  extended, 
too,  as  an  expression  of  acclaim  and  homage,  in  the 
manner  in  which  it  appears  also  in  the  gospels.     Yet  for 
all  that  we  have  to  declare  it  utterly  inconceivable  that 
the    same    multitude,    consisting    doubtless    mostly    of 
unlearned  folk,  should  have  newly  coined,  and  on  the 
spur  of  the  moment,  the  additional  phrase,  "Hosanna  in 
the  highest,"  which  is  also  put  into  their  mouth  in  the 
above-noted  gospel.     There  was,  w^e  assert,  no  analogy 
for   it   anywhere  in   Hebre^v   Scripture.     No    celestial 
anthem  is  in  its  entire  volume  represented  under  such 
foi-m.     We  have  therefore  no  alternative  but  to  assume 
that  the  gospel  writer  created  it  anew  from  his  own  mind, 
accomplishing  it  by  way  of  discursive  reference  to  the 
cited   psalm    verse.     In   Luke    the   case   is   still   more 
agg-ravated.     He  enlarges  the  acclaim,  "Blessed,  etc.," 
by    inserting    "king" — a    new    formation    again — and 
attributes   to  the  multitude  the  further   exclamation: 
"peace  in  heaven  and  glory  in  the  highest"  (XIX.  38). 
The  latter  phrase,  we  remark,  is  evidently  stereotyped 
with  Luke,  as  would  appear  from  the  parallel  of  ch.  11. 
14,  which  is  the  subject  proper  of  our  disquisition.     The 
phrase  is,  truly,  fitting  enough,  though  it  is  not  borne  out 
by  any  direct  and   exact  Hebrew  Scriptural  analogy. 
As  we  have  set  forth  elsewhere  in  our  text,  it  is  likely 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       67 

to  have  been  substantiallj  drawn  from  Ps.  CXLVIII.  1. 
Yet,  we  have  curiously  to  ask,  how  did  Luke  come  to 
combine  with  it  the  other  phrase,  "peace  in  heaven?" 
We  cannot  possibly  detect  in  it  any  intelligible  import, 
and  certainly  no  sense  appropriate  to  the  occasion.  It 
may  be  accounted  for,  though,  as  a  random  formation 
from  Job  XXV.  2.  This  passage  may  have  been  present 
to  Luke's  mind  when  he  put  do^vn  that  account.  But 
then  we  have  to  conclude  that  he  thought  fit  to  utilize  it 
in  his  own  way,  -without  stopping  to  reflect  upon  the 
organic  meaning  it  has  in  that  context  of  Job,  a  meaning 
entirely  inapplicable,  in  fact,  to  the  event  of  Jesus' 
entry.  Moreover,  the  phrase  as  produced  by  Luke  is 
liable  to  be  understood  as  an  imputation  that  God  had 
until  then  lacked  peace,  which  was  now  fairlv  assured 
and  firmly  established  for  evermore.  If  it  be  said  that 
this  is  not  a  necessary  deduction  from  Luke's  plirase,  we 
reply,  that  we  marvel  what  other  reasonable  construction 
could  at  all  be  placed  on  it. 

(2).  Such  as  Bleek,  Olshausen,  Ewald,  Tischendorf, 
etc.  The  last-named  defends  it  on  the  ground,  that  the 
^'hymn  is  most  fitly  divided  into  two  clauses,  of  which 
the  first  reaches  to  "Theo,"  and  the  other  contains 
the  rest."  We,  for  our  part,  have  to  own  that  we 
fail  to  see  wherein  that  fitness  should  subsist.  It  can  be 
made  out  the  less,  when  w-e  bear  in  mind  that  the 
amalgamation  of  all  that  ensues  upon  "Theo"  into 
one  clause,  requires  the  construction  of  the  genitive, 
^'eudokias."  This  construction,  however,  gives  in  our 
opinion  no  tolerable  sense.  Our  objections  to  it  are  set 
forth  at  length  in  the  text  of  our  essay.  Let  us  yet 
note,  that  Keim,  to  us  the  foremost  and  most  competent 


68  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

of  all  tlie  -writers  of  the  Life  of  Jesus,  accepts  also  the 
reading  "eudokias,"  in  the  genitive.  "Otherwise,"  he 
observes,  "there  are  three  members  in  the  sentence,  only 
one  for  God,  two  for  man,  and  these  moreover  opposed 
to  each  other  without  real  antithesis." 

Here  we  deem  it  in  place  to  present  that  eminent 
scholar's  observations  on  the  entire  respective  passage  of 
Luke.  Contrasting  (in  'The  History  of  Jesus  of  Nazara', 
11.  79  ff.)  Matthew's  brief  notice  of  the  birth  of  Jesus, 
he  says  of  Luke :  "Luke  and  his  Ebionite  authority  have 
provided  more  extensive  scenery  for  the  birth  itself — 
signs  in  heaven  and  on  earth,  etc.  .  .  .  Luke's  Ebionite 
informant  has  to  tell  of  blinding  glory  from  heaven,  of 
a  watch  both  human  and  angelic  which  welcomes  the 
new  comer  with  warmth  and  solemnity  combined.  An 
angel  of  the  Lord  appears  (here  he  remarks  in  a  note: 
"Luke  is  elsewhere  full  of  ideal  allusions").  In  Beth- 
lehem he  arouses  none  from  slumber  it  is  true;  but  he 
makes  his  way  to  the  shepherds,  ....  and  declares 
to  them  instead  of  fear,  gTeat  joy  for  the  whole  people, 
"for  unto  you  is  born  this  day,  etc,"  And  while  he 
names  to  them  the  sure  sign  (v.  12),  a  heavenly  host 
surrounds  him  rejoicing  in  the  deed  of  God,  congratu- 
lating these  representatives  of  humanity  on  the  gracious 
advent,  "Glory  be  to  God  in  the  heights  and  welfare  upon 
earth  to  men  in  whom  he  is  well  pleased."  The  heavens 
retired  from  view,  the  shepherds  hastened,  sought 
and  saw  the  child,  etc." 

In  this  connection  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  bring  for- 
ward Strauss'  relative  judgment.  In  'Life  of  Jesus' 
(4th  ed.,  transl.  by  George  Eliot)  he  dilates  first  on 
Luke's  chronological  incongimities  (as  to  the  census,  etc.). 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       69 

and  on  his  design  to  "accommodate  the  time  and  circum- 
stances attending  the  birth  of  Jesus  to  his  pleasure."  He 
produces  then  the  various  constructions  put  on  those 
circumstances  by  different  expositors.  First  he  men- 
tions the  supranaturalistic  construction,  then  the  attempt 
at  a  natural  explanation,  and  lastly  he  gives  his  0"\vn 
interpretation.  This  is,  that  the  vi^hole  narrative  of 
Luke's  is  entirely  mythical.  He  advances:  "The  mythi 
of  the  ancient  world  more  generally  ascribed  divine 
apparitions  to  countrymen  and  shepherds;  the  sons  of 
the  gods  and  of  great  men  were  frequently  brought  up 
among  shepherds."  (He  might  have  cited  as  parallel 
also  the  legendary  circumstances  attending  the  birth  of 
Buddha.)  He  insists,  conclusively,  that  "historical  truth 
is  not  to  be  sought  either  in  chapter  II.  or  I.  of  Luke." 

(3).  Before  arriving  at  this  final  decision  he  had 
entered  into  Lange's  own  construction  of  the  sentence, 
concurring  in  it  in  the  main,  not  only  in  regard  to  the 
reading  "eudokia,"  in  the  nominative,  but  also  as  to  his 
assumption  that  the  "theme  and  motive"  of  the  whole 
angelic  song  was  to  be  sought  in  that  very  word.  He 
could  only  not  subscribe  to  Lange's  interpretation  of 
"eirene"  as  "praise  and  honor."  According  to  this  Ger- 
man commentator  the  sense  of  the  doxology  would  be: 
"Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  and  on  earth  praise, 
(because  there  is)  good-will  (of  God)  towards  men," 
namely,  through  the  reconciling  power  of  the  (eventual) 
death  of  Jesus,  then  come  into  being. 

(4).  Blobmfield,  in  his  commentary,  in  loco,  gives 
implicitly  the  same  dogmatic  turn  to  the  doxology.  He 
contends  though  for  the  received  reading  "eudokia," 
also  for  the  grammatical  division  of  the  sentence  into 


'^0  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

tliree  members.  We  infer  from  liis  observations  tbe 
following  sense  to  be  put  on  the  doxology:  "Glorj  to 
God  in  the  liigliest,  (for)  on  eartli  (there  is)  peace  (viz., 
with  God),  among  men  (God's)  good  pleasure."  The 
two  last  clauses  he  takes  as  containing  the  cause  and 
motive  for  the  doxology  proper. 

(5).  It  would  seem  to  us  that  among  the  early 
Christ-believers  there  w^as  the  habit  of  denoting 
technically  any  prophetic  Messianic  presage,  either 
traditionally  regarded  as  such  or  newly  invested  with 
such  ultimate  bearing,  as  "good"  or  "glad  tidings." 

It  strikes  us  further  as  probable,  that  Christianity 
itself  had  originally  received  as  title  that  favorite  expres- 
sion, the  "good  tidings  (or  gospel)  of  peace."  At  its 
very  beginning,  when  it  consisted  only  in  the  preaching 
of  the  approaching  Kingdom  of  God,  this  preaching 
itself  passed  under  that  attractive  name.  At  the  later 
point,  when  Paul  had  advanced  his  own  theological 
system,  it  is  patent  from  Rom.  X.  15  that  he  applied, 
mentally  at  least,  that  appellation  to  Christianity  as  he 
had  himself  construed  it. 

The  phrase,  it  is  deserving  of  notice,  points  to  Isa. 
LII.  7,  as  ils  source  of  derivation.  While  Kahum  II. 
1,  has  the  same  expression  "gospelling  of  peace,"  yet  the 
stronger  probability  is  that  its  Christian  adoption  was 
from  the  former  place.  We  base  it  on  the  consideration 
that  a  certain  partiality  to  the  prophecies  of  the  Second 
Isaiah,  alike  by  Jesus  and  the  early  Christological 
writers,  can  variously  be  traced  and  proved  to  have  been 
settled  in  Christianity  already  at  its  earliest  time.  It 
is  especially  the  local  environment  of  that  phrase  in 
Isaiah  which  was  exploited  with  set  purpose  and  marked 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       7 1 

fondness  for  Christian  evidences.  That  the  notorious 
sequel,  beginning  with  Isa.  LII.  13,  was  by  Christian 
Messiahists  eagerly  seized  and  treated  for  doctrinal 
objects,  is  easily  provable  and  will  by  no  competent 
inquirer  be  called  in  question.  If,  then,  the  votaries  of 
the  new  creed  sought  for  a  suitable  name  which  they 
might  give  it,  they  had  not  to  search  long  for  it.  It 
offered  itself  promptly  from  the  same  chapter  with  which 
they  were  so  well  familiarized. 

We  remark  additionally  that  there  is  all  the  greater 
probability  that  the  phrase  in  point  was  taken  from 
Isaiah  and  not  from  Nahum,  when  we  recollect  that 
Paul,  in  reflecting  on  the  preaching  of  the  Christian 
system  as  the  "glad  tidings,"  in  Rom.  X.  15,  16,  quoted 
the  whole  verse  of  Isa.  LII.  7  (the  final  clause  excepted), 
of  which  that  phrase  forms  a  part. 

It  is  yet  to  be  noted,  however,  that  its  appropriation 
with  a  Messianic  meaning  was  but  arbitrary,  and  had  no 
countenance  from  the  logical  sense  it  bears  in  the 
prophetic  passage.  In  neither  passage  of  Isaiah  or 
Xahum,  we  aver,  the  '"gospelling  of  peace"  can  be  given 
out  as  really  or  even  figuratively  referable  to  Messiah. 
The  Messiah  is  not  mentioned  or  thought  of  in  either 
place.  It  is  God  himself  who  is  represented  as  dealing 
with  Israel's  foe — Assyria  in  the  one  and  Babylonia  in 
the  other  prophet.  The  announcement  of  slialom 
"peace"  to  Israel  was  thought  by  those  prophets  exclu- 
sively as  being  in  consequence  of  the  overthrow  of  the 
hostile  power  by  God  himself — the  Messiah  having 
nothing  to  do  with  it. 

(6).  Repentance  and  remission  are  named  together 
as  the  combined  theme  of  the  preaching  in  the  name  of 


72  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Jesus;  see  Luke  XXIY.  47.  The  association  of  both 
those  concepts  in  the  mind  of  the  author  of  Lnke  and 
Acts  was  so  strong  and  tenacious,  that  in  the  latter  book 
Jesus  is  mentioned,  even  in  his  heavenly  abode,  where  he 
is  Prince  and  Saviour,  as  "giving  to  Israel  repentance 
and  remission." 

(7).  See  'Acts'  by  Zeller,  who  holds  that  the  greater 
part  of  the  first  two  chapters  of  Luke  is  of  Jewish- 
Christian  origin.  He  otherwise  assumes,  however,  that 
the  author  of  the  gospel  bearing  Luke's  name  was  not  a 
Jew. 

(8).  The  summons  may  fairly  be  construed  as 
inclusive  of  that  part  of  the  heavenly  host  which  were 
not  present  at  the  scene,  and  possibly  likewise  of  the 
celestial  bodies  generally,  just  as  in  the  cited  psalm,  v.  2. 

(9).  To  assert  again  and  again  a  genuinely  and 
strictly  Jewish  base  for  the  original  Christology  is  cer- 
tainly not  gratuitous,  considering  the  great  diversion 
from  it  by  a  more  or  less  contrary  dogTuatic  maze  in 
which  it  had  been  involved  soon  after  the  lifetime  of 
Jesus,  and  in  which  it  rests  yet  to  a  preponderant  degree. 
The  time  is  not  yet  come  for  a  more  general  free  and 
right  historical  estimate  of  the  claim  and  aim  of  Jesus. 
But  come  it  will,  with  the  rapidly  advancing  clear  and 
untrammeled  search  into  all  facts  of  history.  We  for 
our  part  seek  to  bring  out  those  remarkable  and  weighty 
points  into  full  light,  in  our  yet  manuscript  work,  'The 
Messiah  of  the  Jews'.  We  hope  to  be  able  to  give  it  to 
the  world  next  year. 

The  base  we  mentioned  is  the  Jewish  national. 
Jesus'  consciousness  was  irrefutably  that  of  a  national 
Jewish  Messiah.     That  it  was  essentially  affected  by  the 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       73 

(apocalyptic)  Enochic  exalted  notions  of  Messiahism, 
which  partly  altered  the  traditional  and  popnlar  Jewish 
conception  of  Messiah,  is  trne  ;  also  that  Jesus'  religio- 
ethical  system,  if  as  such  the  various  respective  utter- 
ances attributed  to  him  in  the  records  may  be  fixed, 
partook  largely  of  the  Essenic  body  of  doctrines  and 
precepts,  is  no  less  verifiable.  Yet  for  all  that  must  his 
life,  character  and  claim  never  be  considered  away  from 
that  national  Jewish  foundation.  It  admits  of  no  ques- 
tion that  national  Messiahism  was  the  keynote  of  his 
self-feeling  from  the  earliest  time  of  his  known  public 
life,  and  his  prime  advent — his  birth — could  accordingly 
have  been  celebrated  in  the  oldest  sources  only  as  that 
of  a  purely  and  exclusively  Jewish  Messiah.  The  Jew- 
ish national  element  predominates  e.  g.  in  Matt.  XIX. 
28,  though  it  appears  here  suffused  with  what  we  may 
fitly  call  the  Enochic  theory.  It  came  practically  and 
unmistakably  forward  in  the  decisive  event  of  his  noted 
entry  into  Jerusalem  (ibid.  XXI).  And  it  outlasted  his 
life,  as  it  is  most  strikingly  and  convincingly  evident 
from  the  passage  of  Acts  I.  6,  7. 

Let  us  adduce  two  great  representative  and  accredited 
writers  of  the  Life  of  Jesus  who,  with  a  number  of  other 
independent  and  unbiased  Christological  scholars,  look 
at  Jesus'  claim  as  Messiah  in  about  the  same  light  of 
Je\vish  national  consideration. 

Keim  (1.  c.)  in  his  discussion  of  the  'Kingdom  of 
Heaven'  advances:  "All  existing  evidence  goes  to  prove 
that  his  kingdom  of  heaven  was  a  kingdom  on  earth." 
It  was  only  later  that  he  "created  for  his  Messialiship, 
which  was  threatened  by  his  death,  the  new,  transcend- 
ent,   eschatological    heavenly    support."     A    "material 


'^i  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Messianic  feature"  Keim  discovers  at  least  "in  the 
initial  attitude  of  Jesus,"  tliougli  lie  allows  for  the 
'^spiritual  and  moral  fundamental  character  of  his  min- 
istry." But  for  all  that  Jesus  "never  transformed,  by 
so-called  advancement,  the  material  idea  of  the  Messiah 
into  a  purely  spiritual  one."  He  "preached  a  terrestrial 
kingdom  and  taught  a  Messiah  who  was  to  return  to  his 
terrestrial  kingdom."  He  did  not  "repudiate  the  Mess- 
ianic expectations  of  the  age,"  though  he  gave  a  different 
turn  to  the  current  "conception  of  the  terrestrial  king- 
dom" of  Messiah  in  its  application  to  his  own  claim,  and 
"never  sought  to  set  up  such  kingdom  himself  or  by  the 
power  of  the  sword." 

Strauss'  summary  view  (1.  c.)  on  the  Messianic 
endeavor  of  Jesus  is  as  follows:  "Thus  we  conclude 
that  the  Messianic  hope  of  Jesus  was  not  political,  nor 
even  merely  earthly  •  .  .  ;  as  little  was  it  a  purely 
spiritual  hope  :  but  it  was  the  national  theocratic 
hope,  spiritualized  and  ennobled  by  his  own  peculiar 
moral  and  religious  views." 

(10).  In  the  meaning  "prosperity,"  shalom  is 
frequently  paralleled  by  tobh  "good."  See  Jer.  VIII. 
15;  XIV.  19.  Isa.  LII.  7.  Consistently,  we  find  often 
the  opposite  of  shalom  noted  as  raah  "evil;"  see  Ps. 
XXVIII.  3;  Isa.  XL V.  7. 

(11).  Compare  also  "time  of  grace"  (Isa.  XLIX.  8) 
which,  as  is  clear  from  its  parallel  "day  of  salvation," 
has  the  same  Messianic  (or  rather  redemptive)  import. 
A  Christological  turn  it  received  already  by  Jesus,  Avho 
in  his  supposably  first  public  self-avowal  as  Messiah, 
applied  it,  together  with  its  preceding  context,  to  his 
own  Messiahdom;  see  Luke  IV.  18.     That  this  account, 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       75 

at  any  rate  so  far  as  Jesus'  self -attribution  of  tliat  con- 
text is  concerned,  is  genuine,  there  can  be  no  doubt.  It 
is  fully  attested  by  Matt.  XI.  4,  5.  It  is  then,  seeing 
that  that  Isaianic  passage  with  its  shenath  ratson 
"acceptable  year,"  had  been  fully  received  and  firmly 
domesticated  within  the  Christian  body,  not  at  all  strange 
that  Luke  should  in  his  gospel,  in  the  doxology,  have 
alluded  to  that  Hebrew  term  "ratson,"  rendering  it 
with  "eudokia."  It  will  appear  the  less  strange  when  we 
further  remember  chat  this  same  writer  of  Luke-Acts 
produced  in  Acts  X.  38,  the  identical  application  of  that 
l)assage  of  Isaiah  to  Jesus.  This  proves  clearly  that  this 
passage  was  fixed  in  his  thought  as  a  Jesulogical  staple 
reference.  We  hold  it  consequently  most  plausible  that 
the  "eudokia"  of  the  doxology  was  by  Luke  meant  to 
refer  to  Isaiah's  "year  of  grace"  or  "accepted  year," 
which  expression  had  from  the  earliest  days  of  Chris- 
tianity been  employed  as  evidence  for  the  truth  of  Jesus' 
Messiahdom. 

That  "eudokia"  is  not  the  rendering  of  that  expres- 
sion in  the  Septuagint,  can  be  no  valid  objection.  The 
intrinsic  sense  at  any  rate  of  both  the  word  employed 
in  the  latter  place  and  of  'eudokia'  is  identical,  meaning 
"divine  acceptability." 

It  may  not  be  amiss  to  remark  yet,  that  with  our 
explanation  even  the  genitive,  eudokias,  would  not 
conflict,  provided  it  could  be  made  probable  that  in  the 
transcription  or  translation  from  the  original  record  a 
suitable  word,  governing  eudokia,  dropped  out  acci- 
dentally or  was  designedly  eliminated  for  the  sake  of 
conciseness.     AYe  could  then  think  of  "year,"  as  in  Isa. 


'76  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

LXI.  2,  or  "time,"  as  ib.  XLIX.  8,  being  understood  as 
the  governing  word. 

(12).  Sins  of  Israel  prevented  the  coming  of  the 
Messianic  redemption — this  view  predominates  in  the 
old  Rabbinic  literature,  as  we  illustrated  in  "The  Sabbath 
in  History,"  II.  153  sq.  We  there  endeavored  also  to 
make  out  that  John  the  Baptist's  and  Jesus'  cry  of 
repentance  had  for  motive  the  same  traditional  notion, 

(13).  For  the  sublime  estimate  placed  in  Israel  on 
shaloni  "security,"  see  Isa.  XXVI.  3,  and  compare  Zech. 
II.  8,  9.  Akin  to  the  concept  in  the  latter  passage  are 
Jer.  XLIX.  31  and  Ez.  XXXVIII.  11. 

(14).  The  first  commentator  who  suggested  this  ori- 
gin was  the  noted  German  theological  scholar,  Hitzig. 
He  based  it  on  some  parallelisms  with  the  prophet  Joel. 
His  conjecture  is  that  the  passage  in  question  which  now 
stands  in  Isa.  II.  and  Micah  IV.,  had  its  place  originally 
at  the  end  of  Joel's  extant  oracles.  Yet  he  uttered  this 
supposition  of  a  Joelic  origin  without  any  assurance,  as 
he  admitted  that  there  were  objections  against  it. 
Nevertheless,  Ewald,  in  his  'Prophets  of  the  O.  T.,'  has 
approved  and  appropriated  it.  Fiirst  too  adopted  it  in 
his  'Hist,  of  the  Bibl.  Lit.'  Knobel,  and  others  (cited  by 
Steiner,  the  more  recent  editor  of  Hitzig's  Commentary 
on  the  Minor  Prophets,  p.  214)  urged  .the  gi-ave  objection 
against  it,  that  such  generous  universalism  as  is  embodied 
in  that  passage  runs  counter  to  the  express  tendency  of 
Joel. 

A  number  of  other  eminent  expositors  of  both  prev- 
ious and  more  modern  days,  while  they  discountenance  a 
Joelic  origin  of  the  passage,  hold  the  general  view  that 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       77 

it  belong-s  originally  to  some  unknown  prophet  older 
than  either  Micah  or  Isaiah. 

Chejnc,  'Introduction  to  the  Book  of  Isaiah,'  says 
that  he  had  formerly  embraced  Hitzig's  hypothesis,  but 
surrendered  it  since  in  favor  of  a  post-Exilic  date  of  the 
passage.  He  maintains  also  that  Isaiah  II.  2-4  is  taken 
from  Micah  IV.  1  sq.  He  quotes,  further,  Kuenen's 
notion  that  it  was  a  prophetic  fragment  of  an  older 
contemporary  of  Isaiah  and  Micah.  (To  Kuenen  we 
will  later  recur).  He  also  mentions  Duhm's  view  which 
agrees  with  Kuenen's  in  the  estimate  that  the  passage 
is  an  older  fragment,  only  that  it  is  to  be  assigned  to 
Isaiah  himself.  The  prophet,  Duhm  presumes,  wrote 
it  in  his  old  age,  in  which  he  laid  down  his  "highest  and 
most  sublime  ideas"  about  the  future. 

Like  Cheyne,  Nowack,'The  Minor  Prophets,' assumes 
a  later  origin  of  the  passage  than  the  times  of  Isaiah  and 
Micah,  though  he  does  not  ultimately  decide  on  a  post- 
Exilic  date.  Yet  he  differs  from  him  on  the  question 
of  the  priority  of  the  verses  as  between  Isaiah  and  Micah. 
He  disputes  the  possibility  of  Isaiah  having  borrowed 
them  from  Micah,  on  the  ground  that  chapts.  II.-IV.  of 
Isaiah  can  scarcely  be  set  down  as  of  a  later  date  than  the 
reign  of  Ahaz,  while  the  principal  activity  of  Micah  fell 
admittedly,  from  rather  sure  evidence,  in  the  days  of 
Hezekiah.  (Both  these  scholars  by  the  bye  seem  to  have 
influenced  our  own  Professor  Toy  ('Judaism  and 
Christianity')  to  incline  even  to  as  late  a  date  of  Isa.  II. 
2-4  as  the  fifth  century  B.  C.)  The  determining  motive 
in  Nowack's  argument  (in  Micah  IV.),  which  made  him 
fall  in  with  the  modern  critical  theory  that  the  passage 
is  of  a  later  date  and  was  by  a  later  hand  wrought  in  the 


78  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  tlie  Prophetic 

two  places  where  it  now  stands,  was  that  part  of  it  which 
deals  \\dtli  the  supposed  idea  of  the  conversion  of  the 
heathens  (Isa.  II.  2,  3;  Micah  lY.  1,  2).  Though  he 
allows  that  the  Hebrew  literature  of  the  Assyrian  epoch 
offers  some  analogies  for  the  thought  of  a  peace  empire 
to  be  established  in  the  Messianic  times,  yet  he  claims 
that  no  parallel  is  found  in  it  for  the  other  part  which  has 
for  its  subject  the  universal  conversion  of  the  Gentiles 
to  the  religion  of  Jehovah.  He  admits  that  "the  root 
of  this  idea"  occurs  otherwise  in  Isaiah,  yet  in  all  pas- 
sages of  this  kind,  he  insists,  Judah  and  Jerusalem  are 
always  the  center:  there  is  no  such  broad  universalism  in 
them  as  in  the  passage  at  issue. 

jSTow  this  discrimination  of  ISTowack's  is  absolutely 
hanging  in  the  air.  As  though  Jerusalem  were  not 
everywhere,  where  the  idea  of  an  ethnical  attraction  to 
Jehovah  is  celebrated,  either  stated  or  understood  as  the 
center!  Moreover,  Kuenen  has  already  refuted  his 
hypercritical  position,  that  a  universalistic  temper  was 
entirely  wanting  to  the  writers  of  the  earlier  times,  and 
also  that  the  earliest  date  in  which  those  verses  of  Isa.  II. 
and  Micah  TV.  can  have  fallen,  was  that  of  the  Exile. 
He  controverts  this  modem  exegetical  extravaganza  with 
very  close  arguments  in  his  'Hist.-Crit.  Introd.  to  the 
Books  of  the  O.  T.,'  p.  38.  It  is,  in  fact,  Stade,  its 
spiritual  author,  whom  he  calls  to  task  for  it.  His 
argumentation  applies  of  course  as  well  against  I^owack 
who  follows  in  Stade's  track,  as  likewise,  let  us  add, 
against  Cheyne  who  has  joined  these  critics  in  his  more 
recent  exegesis  given  in  'Introd.  to  the  Book  of  Isa.' 
The  last-named  expositor  avows  there  a  change  of  view 
from  previous  time  and  maintains  now  that  the  passage 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       '<'9 

of  promise  in  those  two  prophets  ''is  the  work  of  a  post- 
Exilic  imitator  of  the  older  prophets." 

It  was,  we  remark,  in  the  first  volume  of  the  Zeit- 
schrift  flir  die  alttest.  Wiss.'  (1881),  that  Stade  urged 
that  novel  proposition.  A  later  writer,  he  suggests,  who 
moved  in  the  mental  sphere  of  the  Second  Isaiah,  may 
have  inserted  those  verses  in  both  places,  in  Isaiah  and 
Micah.  He  marks  in  objection  against  an  Isaianic  or 
Micaic  origin  and  employment  of  the  verses — and  in  this 
objection  we  too  share  most  earnestly  and  emphatically; 
see  our  third  chapter  of  the  present  disquisition — 
that  in  both  places,  especially  in  Micah,  there 
is  such  a  decided  clash  between  them  and  the 
other  context.  He  declares  it  utterly  improbable 
that  Micah,  judging  by  Jer.  XXVI.  17  ff.,  should  have 
weakened  (rather  invalidated)  the  impression  of  his 
prophecy  contained  in  ch.  III.  12,  by  an  immediately 
subsequent  prediction  of  its  sheer  opposite.  He  then  goes 
on  to  say  that  the  verses  show  no  relationship  at  all  with 
the  kind  of  prophecy  that  prevailed  in  the  Assyrian 
epoch.  Especially  does  he  point  out  that  the  univer- 
salistic  spirit  picturing  a  "concourse  of  nations  coming 
to  Jerusalem  to  worship,"  does  not  fit  in  with  that 
anterior  period,  but  comports  rather  with  the  prophetic 
tendency  of  the  Exile,  such  as  meets  us  in  Isa.  LXVI. 
23  (cp.  ibid.  LX.)  and  Zechariah  XIV.  16-19  (which  last 
he  assigns  to  the  period  after  Ezekiel,  even  after  the 
Exile).  He  also  observes  that  the  situation  in  which 
Jerusalem  is  depicted  in  the  verses  of  promise  in  Micah, 
differs  so  essentially  from  that  apparent  in  the  previous 
chapters  I.-III. ;  and  insists,  further,  that  the  sentimental 
expression  in  Micah  IV.  4,  has  its  direct  analogue  only 


80  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

in  late  Scriptural  utterances.  Accordingly,  he  con- 
cludes, we  can  set  down  as  the  earliest  possible  date  of 
the  composition  of  those  verses,  Isa.  II.  2-4  and  Micah 
IV.  1-4,  the  period  of  the  Exile. 

Stade  developed  this  theory  further  in  subsequent 
parts  of  the  ^Zeitschrift.'  These  were  however  not 
readily  accessible  to  us.  Kuenen  (1.  c.)  is  sponsor  for 
the  summary  opinion,  collected  from  all  of  Stade's  dis- 
cussions of  that  subject,  that  this  exegetical  critic  holds 
that  "the  prophets  of  the  eighth  century  had  in  their 
eyes  always  one  people  or  certain  distinct  nations  and 
that,  though  they  bring  forward  now  and  then  an  homage 
rendered  to  Jehovah  by  one  or  more  foreign  nations,  jei 
the  idea  of  a  conversion  of  "many  nations"  or  "all 
nations"  (compare  Isa.  II.  2  with  ibid.  3,  and  Micah  IV. 
1,  2),  was  yet  foreign  to  them  and  the  ante-Exilic 
prophecy  generally.  Against  this  hypothesis  Kuenen, 
pronouncing  it  mildly  enough  as  bordering  on  the  hyper- 
critical, adduces  an  array  of  ante-Exilic  prophecies  in 
which  he  claims  that  that  idea  of  Gentile  conversion  is 
more  or  less  clearly  embodied.  (His  claim  is  by  the 
bye  only  partly  justified/  however).  He  concludes  by 
saying:  "Unreservedly  we  admit  that  that  idea  became 
only  general,  and  as  well  part  of  the  popular  belief,  dur- 
ing and  after  the  Exile.  But  this  is  no  ground  for 
denying  that  already  in  the  eighth  century  a  single 
prophet  may  have  elevated  himself  to  it." 

We  fully  agree  with  him  in  this  judgment  and  reject 
as  totally  unfounded  that  extravagant  notion  represented 
by  Stade  and  ISTowack. 

But  we  decidely  call  in  question  no  less  the  whole 
pivotal  point  upon  which  the  latter  rests  his  argument 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       81 

for  a  late  date  of  the  verses  under  discussion.  He  is  dis- 
posed to  let  the  question  of  their  date  stand  or  fall  with 
the  one  problem,  whether  the  early  prophets  Isaiah  and 
Micah  were  already  advanced  enough  to  forecast  a  gen- 
eral conversion  of  the  Gentiles  to  the  religion  of 
Jehovah.  As  he  has  to  negative  such  possibility,  he 
determines  ultimately  upon  the  late  composition  of  the 
verses. 

Now  we  diifer  positively  on  the  view  that  a  religious 
conversion  of  the  heathens  was  alluded  to  there.  We 
cannot  bring  ourselves  to  detect  in  that  prophetic  pas- 
sage of  promise  any  such  purport  at  all.  To  find  with 
Cheyne,  who  also  takes  the  respective  sentences  of  that 
passage  in  the  sense  of  conversion,  in  the  "ways"  of 
Jehovah  (Isa.  II.  3)  "the  rules  of  moral  and  religious 
conduct,"  and  in  the  issue  of  teaching  from  Zion  (ibid.) 
"the  revelation  of  divine  truth,"  is  to  us  an  imputation 
to  the  prophet  of  a  mental  association  for  which  there  is 
no  reasonable  support  in  the  construction  of  the  whole 
passage.  Not  that  a  universalistic  standpoint,  including 
the  spiritual  hope  of  a  universal  acceptance  of  the  true 
faith  of  Jehovah  by  many  or  all  nations  of  the  world, 
was  foreign  to  the  poet-preachers  of  the  eighth  century 
B.  C.  By  no  means.  We  hold  them  just  as  capable  of 
having  formed  such  conception  as  the  prophets  of  and 
after  the  Exile.  But  we  maintain,  on  the  other  hand, 
that  the  context  of  the  passage  at  issue  does  not  in  the 
least  call  for  such  interpretation.  Nay,  we  would  even 
regard  it  as  violence  to  put  such  meaning  upon  it.  Let 
us  state  it  as  our  conviction  that  the  two  leading  themes 
of  that  passage,  the  homage  owned  and  rendered  to 
Jehovah  by  the  other  nations  in  Jerusalem,  his  sacred 


82  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

abode  and  Israel's  national  center,  and  the  general  (or 
nniversal)  reign  of  peace,  were  intended  to  bear  on  Israel 
only  and  redound  to  their  benefit  and  happiness.  Care 
about  the  welfare  of  the  heathens  was  not  the  motive 
or  one  of  the  motives  of  holding  out  such  an  ideal  picture 
of  the  future.  Much  less  did  the  thought  of  their  spirit- 
ual well-being  enter  the  mind  of  the  prophet,  whoever 
he  was  that  uttered  these  sentiments  first.  What  he  was 
concerned  about  in  his  Hebrew  patriotic  mind  was  not 
the  Gentile  conversion  to  true  religion,  but  their  con- 
version to  a  pacific  attitude  to  his  people,  Israel.  He 
may,  for  aught  we  know,  have  felt  for  them  in  his  heart 
of  hearts  and  wished  them  all  spiritually  safe.  But  the 
question  in  our  famous  passage  of  promise  was  not  that 
of  the  pagans'  religious  faith,  and  for  their  own  sal- 
vation. It  was  the  question  of  peace  and  welfare  for 
Israel  in  the  future  which  stood  uppermost,  nay  exclu- 
sively, before  the  prophet's  vision  on  putting  forth  such 
glowing  outlook.  It  alone  made  up  the  basal  character 
of  the  entire  passage.  Words  of  promise  that  should 
come  home  to  the  real,  innermost  feeling  of  the  ancient 
Israelite  must  have  been  fraught  with  the  burden  of 
shalom  "peace  and  w^elfare"  for  himself  and  his  nation. 
All  that  would  conduce  to  and  insure  this  "shalom"  was 
eagerly  and  supremely  desired :  even  the  pagan  nations' 
recogTiition  of  Israel's  God,  in  so  far,  that  is,  that  they 
would  come  and  consult  His  oracles  in  Jerusalem,  the 
seat  of  His  supreme  sovereignty,  administered  tempo- 
rally by  His  Anointed  Prince,  together  with  His 
appointed  priests  and  prophets.  That  they  Avould  to 
this  end  and  on  such  occasion  also  bow  down  at  His 
shrine  and   offer  worship  to  Him,   was  a  self-evident 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       83 

supposition,  for  local  adoration  was  in  all  oracular  seats 
of  the  world  part  of  the  consultation.  But  this  did  not 
necessarily  involve  a  consistent  and  stable  turn  of  mind 
from  polytheism  or  idolatry  to  Israel's  true  faith  and 
worship.  Those  nations  might  persist — for  all  the  ordi- 
nary Israelite  cared  substantially — in  their  respective 
national  creeds  and  worships,  as,  for  instance,  the  cured 
Syrian,  JSTaaman,  was  frank  enough  to  ask  for  the  privi- 
lege of  making  obeisance  to  Rimmon  by  the  side  of  his 
new  faith  in  Jehovah  (2  King-s  V.  17,  18).  Further- 
more, a  clenching  proof  of  this  our  view  is  supplied  by 
the  writer  of  Micah  lY.  1-5  himself.  Apart  from  the 
modern  critical  question  of  the  authorship  of  that  dis- 
course, there  will  unavoidably  strike  the  unsophisticated 
reader  the  bare  fact,  that  the  writer  or  editor  of  those 
iive  successive  verses  never  for  a  moment  stumbled  over 
the  striking  inconsistency — if  such  there  really  was,  as 
there  must  have  been  according  to  the  conversion  theo- 
rists— of  verse  5  with  w.  1,  2.  The  sense  in  which 
that  verse  appears  is  undoubtedly:  "let  all  the  other 
nations  continue  to  follow  their  own  gods;  we  will  for 
ever  adhere  to  Jehovah,  our  G^od."  But,  we  say,  there 
was  no  such  inconsistency  felt  in  the  mind  of  that 
exponent  of  Hebrew  sentiment.  If  the  condition  would 
once  be  such  that  each  Israelite  could  "sit  safe  and  pros- 
perous under  his  vine,  etc."  (v.  4),  as  he  had  to  fear 
no  more  any  pagan  dependence  and  hostilities, 
then  the  consummation  of  earthly  happiness  was 
reached  for  him  and,  for  the  matter  of  that, 
the  prophet  as  well.  Those  pagans  might  worship 
whomever  they  pleased,  if  they  would  only  be  awed  by 
Israel's  God  into  abstaining  from  troubling  and  harming 


84  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

His  people.  This  interpretation  is  indeed  in  our  percep- 
tion compelled  by  tlie  context  of  Micali  at  least.  The 
plain  sense  is:  Jehovah's  supreme  sovereignty  once 
ostensibly  recognized  by  the  continuous  concourse  of 
other  peoples  in  Jerusalem  for  receiving  oracular  reve- 
lations in  all  their  politico-social  affairs  (this  is  chiefly, 
if  not  wholly,  the  meaning  of  "Torah"  and  of  the  "word 
of  Jehovah"  in  Micah  IV.  1-3),  these  peoples  would 
accordingly  cease  all  invasions  and  assaults  upon  Israel. 
Even  the  re-conversion  of  their  weapons  into  agri- 
cultural implements  held  out  in  this  prophecy,  had  not 
as  ultimate  view  the  universal  cessation  of  warfare — for 
the  benefit  of  the  whole  world.  We  freely  allow  that 
the  prophet  mil  have  been  large-hearted  enough  to  wish 
for  universal  concord  and  amity  between  all  the  nations 
of  the  world.  But,  we  protest,  he  did  not  mean  to  convey 
such  sense  here.  We,  for  our  part,  keep  firmly  to  the 
leading  sense  of  the  whole  passage  of  Micah  IV.  1-4 — 
and  Micah  will  after  all  have  to  be  taken  with  Gesenius, 
Hitzig  and  others,  despite  a  certain  chronological  objec- 
tion, as  the  original  source  from  which  the  kindred  pas- 
sage in  Isaiah  was  transcribed.  This  sense  we  find 
incontrovertibly  indicated  in  the  last  of  the  four  verses 
of  the  passage.  It  gives,  in  our  opinion,  unmistakably 
the  determining  logical  point  of  the  three  preceding 
verses,  in  the  words,  "And  they  (the  Israelites — as  no 
other  nation  can,  from  the  peculiar  choice  of  phraseo- 
logy, have  been  alluded  to  here)  shall  sit  every  man 
under  his  vine  and  under  his  fig  tree,  etc."  The  aim  of 
the  whole  prediction  for  the  future  was,  accordingly,  no 
other  than  Israel's  peace  and  security.  This,  the 
prophet  suggested,  would  be  insured  by  the  turning,  in 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       85 

tlie  after-days,  of  bloody  weapons  into  utensils  of 
husbandry.  And  altlioug'li  lie  adds  immediately, 
"nation  shall  not  lift  up  a  sword  against  nation,"  this 
cannot  have  been  meant,  from  the  sure,  single  drift  of 
the  entire  poetical  passage,  as  the  ultimate,  or  even  only 
dominant  view  the  prophet  had  in  mind  in  this  context, 
however  fondly  he  may,  as  aforesaid,  have  otherwise 
cherished  such  ideal  consummation  upon  genuine 
principles  of  humanity.  The  reduction  and  disuse 
of  arms  by  the  Gentile  nations  would,  surely, 
prevent  their  warring  with  one  another — and  this  would 
be  a  high  blessing  for  all  of  them.  But  the  prophet 
had  not  here  held  such  blessing  in  view.  He  only 
thought  in  the  main  of  that  blessing  which  would 
redound  to  Israel  through  such  discarding  of  military 
instruments  by  the  Gentile  peoples. 

It  was,  we  aver,  neither  the  peace  of  the  Gentile  peo- 
ples for  their  own  happiness  nor,  surely,  their  religious 
conversion  that  was  here  the  object  which  the  prophet 
had  in  view.  The  Torah  "instruction"  they  would  seek 
in  "Zion,"  was  no  other  than  the  oracular  disclosure  as  to 
all  their  cases  and  causes  of  a  national  anxiety.  The 
express  expectation  was  (ibid.  3),  that  Jehovah  would  be, 
with  his  terrestrial  representatives  residing  in  Jerusalem, 
the  warless  arbiter  in  all  their  feuds  and  quarrels, 
mutual  as  well  as,  and  pre-eminently  so,  with  Israel.  It 
is  thus  seen  that  of  the  two  above-noted  themes  of  the 
prophetic  passage  in  question^  the  one  holding  out  endur- 
ing peace  was  paramount,  and  the  other  only  secondary 
and  subsidiary. 

Would  we  say  that  the  religious  element  was  entirely 
excluded  from  this  prophecy?     By  no  means.     More  or 


86  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

less  of  religious  "instruotion"  would  inevitably  go  along' 
Avitli  and  be  attendant  on  the  relations  painted  by  the 
prophet.  To  own  fealty  to  a  heavenly  over-lord  and  his 
mundane  substitute,  means  necessarily  to  heed  their 
combined  commandments  and  rules,  both  politico-econo- 
mical and  religio-ethical.  Moreover,  naitional  and 
religious  considerations  were  in  antiquity  never  held 
apart,  but  were  intensely  and  densely  interwoven  with 
one  another.  But  what  we  wished  to  urge  above  all 
was  that  the  conversion  of  the  heathens  was  in  that 
passage  no  dominant  and  independent  thought  at  all,  in 
the  sense  in  whidh  Stade,  Nowack  and  Cheyne  con- 
strue it. 

It  thus  results,  too,  that,  if  Nowack's  reasoning  were 
right  that  there  was  no  other  real  exegetical  obstacle  in 
the  way  of  assigning  the  passage  in  point  to  a  prophet 
of  the  Assyrian  epoch,  than  the  subject  of  the  conver- 
sion of  the  Gentiles  alleged  to  be  contained  in  it  organi- 
cally and  conspicuously,  it  could  stand  firm  and  solid  as 
such  early  prophetic  production.  The  difficulty  would  be 
relieved  and  the  older  authorship  vindicated. 

Let  us  remark  that  our  own  view,  presented  in  the 
foregoing,  is  apparently  shared  by  Robertson  Smith,  in 
his  Troph.  of  Israel,'  pp.  289  and  291. 

]^ow  to  return,  in  conclusion,  to  Kuenen  and  his  own 
construction  of  Isa.  II.  2-4  and  Micali  IV.  1-4.  He 
maintains  that  neither  prophet  can  be  supposed  to  have 
copied  from  the  other.  He  strongly  assumes,  too,  that 
the  passage  in  either  prophet  comes  from  an  older  origi- 
nal which  is,  however,  not  traceable  in  the  extant 
literary  history  of  Israel.  Its  author  is  unknown.  He 
may  have  been  an  older  contemporary  oT  Isaiah.     Kue- 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       87 

nen  suggests,  furtlier,  that  while  there  is  a  possi- 
bility that  Isaiah  took  and  incorporated  it  into  liis 
own  oracles  as  an  introductory  discourse,  yet,  as 
there  is  a  clashing  of  context  between  it  and 
the  sequel,  it  is  improbable  that  the  passage  should 
be  attributable  to  Isaiah,  even  only  as  an  adoption  from 
a  prophetic  predecessor.  He  prefers  to  think  accord- 
ingly, that  it  was  inserted  by  the  compiler  of  the  subject- 
matter  of  Isa.  II.  if. 

(15).  That  we  marked  "I.  Zechariah"  should  in  the 
present  day  scarcely  need  an  explanation.  Yet  for  those 
unfamiliar  with  the  advanced  theological  research  wc 
remark,  that  upon  fairly  indisputable  grounds  chapters 
I.  to  VIII.  of  Zechariah  have  been  shown  to  belong  to  a 
different  author  from  those  of  the  rest  of  the  book. 
Upon  this  the  critical  scientific  theology  of  modern  times 
is  perfectly  agreed.  A  difference  of  opinion  exists  only 
on  the  latter  portion  of  the  book.  Some  divide  it  again 
into  two  parts  with  separate  authors,  while  others  ascribe 
it  all  to  one.  The  tripartite  notion  is  represented  by 
Hitzig,  Ewald,  Bleek,  Reuss,  Duhm  and  others  (see 
Kuenen,  'Introd.  to  the  Books  of  the  O.  T.,'  II.  p.  387). 

Stade  has  developed  an  independent  theory,  accord- 
ing to  which  all  the  chapters  from  IX.  to  XIV.  belong 
to  one  author  only.  He  is  followed  by  Wellhausen, 
Rob.  Smith  and  Cheyne  (Kuenen,  1.  c.)  Stade,  in  an 
essay  on  the  "Second  Zechariah,"  in  'Zeitschr.  flir  die 
alttest.  Wiss.'  (1881),  declares  the  criticism  which 
assigns  a  pre-Exilic  date  to  chpts.  IX.-XIV.,  erroneous. 
He  assumes  that  these  chapters  come  from  one  author. 
Chpts.  IX.  and  X.  he  adjudges  "in  general  as  post- 
Ezekielic,  and  in  particular  as  post-Exilic."     Ch.  XL  he 


88  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

holds  connected  in  sense  with  XIII.  7-9.     Ch.  XII.  1- 

XIII.  6,  form  to  him  one  oracle.  Ch.  XIV.  he  repre- 
sents as  a  doublet  of  ch.  XII.  1-14  and  XIII.  1-6.  On 
the  whole,  he  sets  down  all  the  chapters  from  IX.  to 

XIV.  as  a  "post-Exilic  product,  a  book  younger  even 
than  Joel."  (The  latter  has  also  by  modern  critics  been 
given  such  a  late  date.  Kuenen,  1.  c,  p.  331  ff.,  decides 
upon  it,  relegating  the  book  of  Joel  even  into  a  period 
later  than  the  middle  of  the  fifth  century  B.  C.) 

(16).  "We  will  never  be  certain  about  the  real  geo- 
graphical boundary  the  Hebrew  writers  held  in  view 
when  they  attributed  to  the  ideal  king  an  extent  of  his 
sovereignity  "to  the  ends  of  the  earth."  It  is  fair  to 
presume  that  they  actually  meant  in  their  heart  no 
farther  stretch  than  the  Jewish  land  had  gained  under 
David.  Consequently,  it  may  only  be  due  to  an  extra- 
vagance of  diction  when  they  mapped  out  the  ideal 
king's  rule  and  possessions,  as  our  prophet  did,  to  reach 
"from  sea  to  sea  (i.  e.  not  only  from  the  Dead  to  the 
Mediterranean  Sea,  but  from  the  Persian  Gulf  to  the 
Red  Sea),  and  from  the  Euphrates  (this  to  be  understood 
as  a  modification  of  the  preceding  clause  respecting  the 
eastern  boundary)  to  the  ends  of  the  earth."  The  latter 
terminus  may  even  not  have  been  intended  to  convey 
more  than  merely  the  Red  Sea,  implied  already  in  the 
previous  expression,  as  the  western  boundary  of  the 
Messianic  realm.  The  reiteration  of  the  identical  west- 
ern boundary  in  other  words,  would  be  easily  account- 
able by  the  manner  of  Hebrew  parallelism. 

(17).  We  admit  that  the  prophet's  expression, 
"speaking  peace  to  the  nations,"  may  fairly  be  construed 
in    a    different    sense.     Upon    the    analogy    of   Psalms 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       S9 

LXXXV.  9,  it  may  mean,  that  the  ideal  king  would 
be  so  pacific  in  temper  and  disposition,  that 
lie  would  generously  decide  upon  "peace  for  (i.  e.  in 
behalf  and  for  the  benefit  of)  the  nations."  The  ex- 
pression would  then  yield  the  sense,  that  he  would 
make  it  his  unshaken  policy  to  leave  all  other  nations 
alone  and  undisturbed  and  involve  them  in  no  bloody 
struggles  by  any  attempt  at  territorial  aggrandizement, 
or  from  any  other  warlike  motive.  It  may  even,  we 
suggest  additionally,  have  the  bare  meaning,  that  the 
ideal  king  would  put  forth  his  conciliatory  efforts  at 
mediating  between  contending  nations  and  bringing 
about  mutual  arrangements,  from  his  pure  love  of  peace, 
and  without  asserting  ostensibly  his  authority  for  dir- 
ecting such  peaceable  ends.  This  view  too  is  admissible. 
However  we  may  understand  the  phrase,  it  is  in  any  case 
testifying  of  the  ideal  king's  pacific  character.  As  a 
congenial  counterpart  to  Zechariah's  picture  of  the 
future  Anointed's  pacific  rule,  we  may  fitly  set  down 
Isa.  XLII.  1-4.  Whoever  that  mysterious  "servant" 
whose  traits  are  there  depicted  may  be — Cyrus,  Israel,  or 
the  representative  prophet  (the  Targum  and  Matthew 
conceive  of  him  as  the  Messiah) — we  find  his  traits 
largely  concurrent  with  those  of  Zechariah's  prospective 
royal  personage.  The  "servant"  too  is  marked  by  a 
mild  and  modest  temperament.  He  also  speaks  forth 
judgments  to  the  nations  and  gives  instructions  to  the 
farthest  parts  of  the  world.  And  when  he  does  exercise 
these  functions,  he  is  inspired  by  a  candor  (emeth,  in 
Hebrew)  which  may  be  taken  to  imply  at  once  an  equit- 
able and  affectionate  regard  for  the  welfare  of  those 
nations. 


90  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

(18),  Even  if  the  Hebrew  word  "ani"  (v.  9)  should 
here  only  mean  "lowly,"  this  would  not  detract  from  the 
main,  pacific,  interpretation  of  the  ideal  king's  character. 
Both  qualities,  meekness  and  peaceableness,  are  cognate 
and  are  most  often  found  joined  together  in  truly 
humane  and  gentle  natures.  If  we  give  the  word  "ani" 
the  sense  of  "lowly,"  we  have  to  take  the  prophet's  words 
as  representing  that  ideal  king  so  meek  in  temper  that 
he  would  from  his  inmost  heart  eschew,  even  disdain 
the  magnificence  of  high  station  and  wealth  displayed,, 
according  to  old  Scriptural  criterions  (see  Jer.  XVII. 
25),  in  the  use  of  horses  and  chariots. 

(19).  "We  refer  for  the  proper  appreciation  of  this 
hyperbole,  which  was  apparently  stereotyped  with  the 
prophets  when  they  discoursed  before  the  common  peo- 
ple on  the  supremacy  of  the  ideal  king  to  come,  to 
note  16. 

(20).  Fiirst,  (1.  c.  p.  467;  cp.  ibid.  p.  302)  repudi- 
ates positively  the  idea  of  the  prophet's  reference  to 
Hezekiah.  The  ground  he  takes  is  that  the  golden  era 
of  a  universal  Theocracy  with  universal  peace  had  not 
really  come  with  that  king  of  Judah.  But  this  is,  to  say 
the  least,  a  most  slender  argument.  As  though  every 
prophetic  prediction  uttered  in  moments  of  mental  and 
emotional  exaltation  had  unfailingly  to  come  true! 
There  would  indeed  be  little  difficulty  to  trace  in  the 
prophets  many  more  unfulfilled  presages  than  accom- 
plished ones.  But  with  this  problem  we  are  not  here 
concerned.  We  may  refer  for  an  intrepid  statement 
of  that  fact,  at  least  as  far  as  Isaiah  is  concerned,  to 
various  places  in  Gesenius'  commentary  on  this  prophet. 
As  very  instructive  and  suggestive  on  this  point  we  have 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       91 

to  pronounce  Bertlieau's  excellent  essay  on  'The  O.  T. 
Prediction  of  Israel's  Imperial  Glory  in  tlieir  own  Land' 
(in  'Jahrb.  for  German  Theology/  1859).  It  yet  merits 
notice  here  that  modern  half-conservative  theology  has, 
in  view  of  that  incontrovertible  circumstance,  contrived 
the  shift  of  distingnishing  between  the  intrinsic  spiritual 
truth  of  a  propliecy  or  its  potential  truth  at  the  time  of 
its  utterance,  and  its  real  fulfillment.  The  latter  was 
not  an  indispensable  requisite,  and  its  apparent  failure 
does  not  alter  the  authenticity  of  the  prophecy.  What 
this  evasive  position  pushed  to  a  close  conclusion 
amounts  to  in  effect  need  not  be  said. 

Fiirst  regards,  further,  the  picture  of  the  ideal  king 
drawn  by  Isaiah  in  ch.  XL  as  a  mere  "product  of  fancy," 
and  assumes  that  the  prophet  adopted  for  his  purpose 
the  whole  respective  sketch  from  an  older  oracle,  that 
of  Joel,  just  as  he  imputes  the  passage  of  Isa.  IL 
2-4  to  this  prior  source. 

Of  the  more  recent  views  on  that  prophetic  predic- 
tion Cheyne's  may  be  quoted.  There  is  to  him  "noth- 
ing to  indicate  that  he  (Isaiah)  thought  of  Hezekiah,  or 
of  any  of  the  children  of  Hezekiah."  He  firmly  holds 
that  the  prophet  is  alike  in  ch.  IX.  and  XL  "unrolling  a 
picture  of  the  future"  (The  Prophecies  of  Isa.,  5th  ed., 
revised). 

(21).  It  may,  we  believe,  be  most  confidently  stated 
that  there  is  a  solid,  organic  connection  between  this 
passage  and  Isa.  XL  1-10.  Robertson  Smith  ('The 
Proph.  of  Isr.,'  p.  305)  completely  identifies  them.  On 
p.  309  ibid,,  he  even  ranges  with  them  in  import  the 
promise  of  Isa.  II.  2-4. 

Kuenen  (1.  c.)  declares  the  passages  of  Isa,  IX.  and 


92  The  Christmas  Motto,  a7id  the  Prophetic 

XL  as  '^accordant"  with  each  other  (p.  52).     In  a  note  (p. 

54)  he  says  that,  considered  hj  themselves,  they  appear 
as  coincident  in  time.  It  must,  however,  be  remarked 
that  that  profound  critic  adduces  in  the  former  place 
several  reasons  for  the  assumption  that  the  contents  from 
ch.  X.  5  to  XI.  1-9  are,  partially  at  least,  spurious.  He 
claims  that  in  their  present  form  they  came  from  the  pen 
of  a  later  revising  imitator  of  the  body  of  those  Isaianic 
prophecies. 

Cheyne,  too,  concedes  the  harmony  between  the 
passages  of  Isa.  IX.  and  XI.  In  'Introd.  to  the  Book  of 
Isa.'  he  calls  ch.  XL  1-9  the  "companion  passage"  of 
ch.  IX.  1-6.  In  'The  Proph.  of  Isr.'  (as  above)  he  says, 
"the  prophecy  of  XL  1-9  supplements  the  vague  predic- 
tions in  chpts.  VII.  14-16;  IX.  6-7,"  foreshowing  the 
Messiah  as  coming  from  the  family  of  David. 

(22).  This  declaration  formed,  according  to  Keim 
(1.  c.)  part  of  Jesus'  last  conversation  with  his  disciples, 
before  his  final  journey  to  Jerusalem,  in  the  year  35. 
That  writer  gives  the  notion  that  the  "energetic  sword 
sermon,"  with  the  sentence,  namely,  "Think  not  that  I 
am  come  to  send  peace,  etc.,"  was  spoken  by  Jesus  more 
to  outline  his  disciples'  position  than  to  define  his  own. 
Jesus,  he  says,  wished  in  that  sermon  to  "equip"  them 
"for  their  independent  future  campaign."  This  con- 
struction put  on  that  conversation  has  the  ostensible 
purpose  of  mollifying  the  harshness  of  Jesus'  saying. 
But  we  object,  it  does  violence  to  the  direct  import  of  the 
text.  Keim's  interpretation  is  by  no  means  supported 
by  the  plain,  unequivocal  phraseology  employed  in  it. 
This  was,  we  aver,  a  reference  to  and  explanation  of 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       93 

Jesus'  o^vll  public  work.  While  we  allow  readily,  as  we 
must,  that  the  words  of  that  conversation  which  precede 
and  follow  the  text  in  point  applied  to  the  disciples,  it 
must  on  the  other  hand  be  consistently  owned  that  the 
words  of  this  text  itself  could  have  been  used  by  Jesus 
for  himself  only.  Keim's  reflections  on  the  motive  of 
that  conversation  of  Jesus,  which  we  -will  immediately 
reproduce,  hold,  indeed,  in  regard  to  various  other  occa- 
sions, and  also  in  regard  to  the  utterances  made  here 
antecedently  and  subsequently  to  the  text  of  the  "sword 
sermon" ;  but  they  are  ill-applied  to  this  veiy  text  itself. 
He  observes:  "Jesus  is  compelled  to  check  again  and 
again  the  sang-uine  anticipations  of  the  disciples,  who  .  . 
.  .  .  are  ever  inclined  to  dream  of  the  Davidic  kingdom, 
of  a  kingdom  of  peace  upon  earth,  of  mere  rest,  joy  and 
blessing,  by  reminding  them  of  the  approaching 
struggle,  and  of  those  sacrifices  which  they,  his  suc- 
cessors, must  share." 

(23).  It  is  curious  to  notice  the  various  alterations, 
in  Matthew's  quotation  of  that  Isaianic  passage,  of  the 
original  Scripture  text.  The  Septuagint  have  already 
some  deviations  from  it.  Yet  our  synoptist  leaves  the 
Greek  version  far  behind  in  his  effort  at  recasting  it. 
This  is,  be  it  said  in  passing,  but  one  out  of  numerous 
instances  in  N".  T.  writings,  in  which  the  transmitted 
Hebrew  texts  or  their  equivalent  in  the  delivered  Sep- 
tuagint have  unhesitatingly  and  arbitrarily  been  re- 
framed  for  tendency.  Space  forbids  to  enlarge  on  this 
matter.  "VVe  can  even  not  discuss  the  diiferent  attempts 
made  by  our  synoptist  at  mending  the  text  in  question. 
One  of  his  changes  we  will  however  set  out,  as  it  is  im- 
mediately in  point.     Instead  of  "He  shall  not  cry,"  as 


94  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

the  perception  of  the  Hebrew  original  is  also  in  the 
Septuagint,  he  has  seen  fit  to  render,  "He  shall  not 
strive."  The  purpose  which  induced  him  to  substitute 
for  the  unequivocal  Hebrew  word  that  expression  from 
his  own  mind,  was  doubtless  no  other  than  to  bring  a 
pretended  authentic  confirmation  of  the  principle  and 
aim  of  his  gospel,  to  find  Jesus'  pliable  temper  and  utter 
opposition  to  all  strife  typified  in  Hebrew  Scripture. 
We  are  yet  to  observe  that  we  purposely  left  out  in 
our  text  the  reference  to  Matt.  XI.  29,"for  I  am  meek  and 
lowly  at  heart."  It  was  for  the  reason  that  we  hold  this 
expression  open  to  two  objections.  The  first  is,  that  it 
strikes  us  as  inexact.  Doubtless,  we  assume,  it  has  been 
imitated  from  Isa.  LXVI.  2.  But  we  hold  it  no  less 
unquestionable,  that  in  the  process  of  formation  after 
this  Isaianic  model  it  underwent  a  peculiar  alteration  and 
transposition.  The  phrase  in  Matthew  differs  from  the 
Septuagint  (in  loco),  in  that  tapeinos  "lowly"  is  drawn 
to  "heart,"  while  in  the  Greek  version,  corresponding  to 
the  Hebrew  text,  it  stands  alone  and  the  word  expressive 
of  the  Hebrew  "necheh  ruach"  (Isa.  ib.)  is  "hesychios," 
which  does  not  occur  in  the  gospel  at  all.  The  Hebrew 
"necheh  ruach"  denotes  there  either  "downcast,"  viz., 
in  the  consciousness  of  sin,  or  "humble,"  in  a  general 
sense,  as  humility  passes  in  'Scripture  frequently  as  a 
human  virtue  so  very  acceptable  to  God.  The  gospel 
writer  has  chosen  as  the  first  epithet  the  Greek  word 
"praos" — as  used  (radically)  in  the  Sepuagint  of  Zech- 
ariali  IX.  9,  for  the  Hebrew  "ani" — instead  of 
"tapeinos,"  according  to  the  Greek  version  of  Isa.  LXVI. 
2,  where  this  word  is  employed  to  render  the  same 
Hebrew  term.     This  would,  indeed,  in  itself  not  make 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       95 

inucli  difference,  as  all  those  concepts  are  kindred  and 
merge  into  one  another.  We  could  even  account  for  the 
gospel  writer's  twofold  adoption  from  the  Greek  version 
of  words  rendering  the  Hebrew  ''ani"  in  this  point  of 
view,  which  is  so  well  borne  out  by  K.  T.  sources,  that 
this  Hebrew  term  was  deep-settled  in  the  minds  of  Chris- 
tian believers  as  being  the  proper  signature  of  the  Mes- 
siah. Yet  we  cannot  reconcile  in  our  mind  that,  if  the 
phrase,  as  it  appears  in  the  gospel,  was  really  used  by 
•Tesus,  he  should  have  purposed  to  change  the  exact 
phraseology  of  the  Isaianic  text  which,  as  aforesaid,  he 
doubtless  had  in  his  thought  when  employing  the  phrase 
according  to  the  gospel. 

If  this  objection  should  appear  too  nice,  we  will  bring 
forward  another  which,  wo  think,  cannot  consistently 
be  considered  so.  We  mean,  that  Jesus'  self-assertion 
of  the  above-cited  traits  of  character  conflict,  in  very 
substance,  with  the  otherwise  so  variously  and,  let  us 
also  say,  authentically  attested  "meekness  and  humility" 
peculiar  to  his  nature  and  temper  of  mind.  It  is  not 
well  conceivable  that  Jesus  should  have  lauded  himself 
in  that  manner.  He  would  by  it  have  almost  negatived 
the  true  essence  of  his  character  for  those  virtues.  That 
the  gospel  writer  should  have  wished  to  thus  carry  out 
the  character  of  Jesus  we  can  readily  understand.  For 
such  description  would  answer  to  the  Christianly  pre- 
dominant view  on  the  Messiah  construed  from  that  pas- 
sage of  Zechariah,  also  from  Isa.  XLII.  1-3.  But  in  the 
mouth  of  Jesus,  and  applied  to  himself,  the  expression, 
"I  am  meek  and  lowly  at  heart,"  must  sound  too  strange 
altogether.  If  the  synoptist  had  recounted  the  affirma- 
tion by  Jesus:  "for  I  am  he  of  whom  it  is  said,  "I  am 


96  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

meek  and  lowly  at  heart"  (alluding  to  Isa.  LXV.  2  and 
Zecli.  IX.  9  combined),  viz.,  the  Messiah,  we  could 
promptly  assent  to  the  representation  imputed  to  him  in 
the  gospel.  For,  as  already  indicated,  such  idea  was 
integrantly  woven  up  in  the  Messianic  texture  held  by 
Jesus  and  those  others  who  put  an  utter  self-renouncing 
meaning  on  that  phrase  of  Zechariah.  But  against  the 
account  as  it  actually  stands  in  the  gospel  we  have  the 
irrepressible  objection,  that  it  jars  too  decidedly  with  the 
ordinary  conception  of  real  human  meekness  and 
humility. 

We  may  further  remark  in  this  place  that  the  sense 
of  resignation  is  not  at  all  implied  in  that  picture  of  the 
Messianic  king  produced  by  Zechariah.  He  is  there, 
truly,  characterized  as  lowly,  yet  none  the  less  also  as  a 
mig^hty  sovereign  with  a  world-wide  dominion.  That 
this  dignity  had  to  be  supported  by  a  commensurate 
superior  tone  and  attitude,  and  that  it  required  a  most 
active,  even  aggressive  policy  and  procedure,  goes  with- 
out saying.  A  passively  and  piously  resigned  kingly 
personage  could  not  possibly  have  done  justice  to  the 
tremendous  task  adjudged  to  the  Messiah  according  to 
his  real  portraiture  given  by  the  prophet,  that  he, 
namely,  had  to  prove  himself  a  valiant  conqueror  of  the 
Gentiles  and,  then,  an  imperial  arbiter. 

Again,  a  modest  peace  ruler  the  Messiah  will  in  the 
sense  of  the  prophet  be  indeed,  yet  he  will  doubtless  also 
guard  his  supreme  mundane  sovereignty  with  the  un- 
yielding persistence  suitable  to  it.  His  high  self-cons- 
ciousness Avill  never  foresake  him. 

Nor  can  we  by  any  means  concur  in  the  more  modern 
critical  exegesis  which  detects  in  the  ani  "lowly"   of 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Em  of  Peace.       07 

Zecli.  IX.  9,  a  monarch  who  will  come  from  the  "class 
of  the  oppressed  pious"  (so  ISTowack,  in  loco,  after  Well- 
hausen),  or  that  the  figure  of  the  expected  Messiah  was 
in  that  passage  raised  into  that  of  a  "spiritual  personage," 
with  the  character  of  a  real  "king  almost  disappearing" 
(Giesebrecht,  in  Xowack).  Xo;  w^e  have  positively  to 
repudiate  such  hypercritical  notion,  fabricated  in  con- 
formity with  the  new-fangled  allegation  of  those 
scholars,  that  the  passage  is  to  be  fixed  at  a  much  later 
date  than  the  lifetime  of  the  real  prophet,  I.  Zechariah. 
"We  are  wearied  by  the  headlong  exegesis  of  those 
modern  'higher  critics.'  They,  many  of  them,  are  at  any 
time  ready  to  construct  a  line  of  novel  premises  and  then 
deduce  from  them  any  notion,  set  against  authentic 
statements,  or  local  or  analogous  evidences  to  the  con- 
trary. The  most  accredited  matter  of  fact  of  Scripture, 
believed  as  such  for  centuries,  and  that  not  only  of 
unthinking  credulity,  but  of  subsequent  rational  judg- 
ment as  well,  they  treat  often  as  a  mere  fabric  of  ancient 
ignorance  or  deficient  knowledge,  if  not  of  wilful, 
though  disguised,  deception.  The  motive  for  all  this 
can  be  no  other  than  a  scientific  whim  which  goads  them 
on  to  their  dazzling  innovations.  When  their  deduc- 
tions are  accomplished,  then  the  process  of  Scriptural 
reconstruction  begins — to  end  nowhere,  or  in  chaos.  It 
is  curious  to  observe  how  they  deal  with  refractory  oppo- 
sites  which  confront  them,  and  often  very  obdurately,  to 
make  them  fit  into  their  logical  schemes.  But  to  our 
subject.  We  remark  that  among  the  'higher  critics'  of 
more  recent  times  the  eminent  writer,  Stade,  stands  out 
in  the  instailce  in  point  as  its  most  correct  exponent, 
proving  for  this  once  at  least  a  conservative  leaning.     In 

7 


98  The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Proplietic 

the  'Zeitsclirift  fiir  die  alttest.  Wiss.'(1881),  lie  discovers 
riglitly  in  Zechariah.  IX.  9,  the  picture  of  a  victorious 
Messianic  conqueror  of  the  Gentiles,  who  at  the  same 
time  choses  to  dispense  with  all  external  magnificence 
before  his  own  people.  This  ideal  king  is  a  pacific  ruler, 
which  he  can  well  be,  after  having  brought  under  all  the 
pagan  principalities. 

Of  the  older  critical  expositors,  Hitzig's  rather  iden- 
tical view  deserves  notice.  He  finds  the  same  ideal  king 
understood  in  that  passage  of  Zechariah  whom  Micah 
celebrates  (ch.  V).  Jehovah,  he  interprets,  has  succored 
this  Messiah  in  the  sweeping  warfare  against  those  heath- 
ens, carried  on  by  him  as  the  national  captain  under  the 
heavenly  leader.  This  he  finds  expressed  in  the  two 
conjoined  predicates  tsaddik  wenosha  "just  and  having 
salvation."  The  immediately  following  representation 
is  to  him  also  closely  combined  in  sense.  This  is,  that 
the  Messiah  proves  himself  an  "ani,"  viz.,  he  mani- 
fests a  gentle  and  pacific  disposition.  Of  this  he  gives 
public  evidence  by  riding  on  the  patient  and  modest 
animal  of  peace,  and  not  on  the  proud,  martial  horse. 

This  is  indeed  the  only  tenable  apprehension  of  the 
passage  in  question.  As  resting  upon  this  only  sound 
foundation  of  logical  thcught  and  provable  analogy,  the 
critics  ought  for  ever  to  leave  it  alone.  And  why  should 
a  servilely  self-abnegating  spirit,  or  a  lowly,  passi- 
vely enduring  personal  and  social  attitude  be  forced 
upon  that  ideal  king  of  Zechariah?  Because  this 
prophet  choses  to  deviate  from  the  idea  other  prophets 
had  of  the  dignity  becoming  the  sublime  monarch  of  the 
future?  (Compare  Jer.  XYII.  25;  XXII.  4;  Isa.  IX. 
5.)     If  Zechariah,  as  it  may  well  be  supposed,  could  not 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.       99 

find  in  his  heart  to  swing  the  ideal  king  into  the  awful 
height  into  which  the  exuberant  fancy  of  Isaiah  exalted 
him,  even  to  the  degree  of  apotheosis;  if  our  prophet 
recognized  it  as  a  higher  merit  that  the  Messiah  should 
move  on  a  footing  with  the  multitude  of  his  subjects  and 
pass  on  the  lowly  level  of  a  rider  on  donkey  back,  is  it 
not  at  once  reasonable  and  fair  to  allow  him  the  privilege 
of  having  formed  such  distinct  idea  of  his  own?  This 
idea  would  even  prove  much  more  attractive  to  us  than 
that  assumed  by  other  prophets.  A  mighty  monarch 
who  disdains  stateliness  and  splendor  and  prefers  dis- 
creet simplicity,  enlists  our  sympathy  so  much  more 
readily  and  sincerely.  A  ruler  who  holds  it  enough  to 
represent  the  divine  rule  of  right  rather  than  aifect  the 
divine  right  of  rule,  wins  the  admiration  of  his'  people 
and  of  the  world.  However  this  may  be,  Zechariah  was 
assuredly  as  much  entitled  to  his  notion  on  the  Messiah, 
as  other  prophets  were  to  theirs.  His  depiction  varied, 
indeed,  from  theirs  in  the  respects  we  mentioned.  Yet, 
on  the  other  hand,  Avhat  Zechariah  would  not  deviate 
from  was,  we  contend,  the  indigenous,  historically  in- 
alienable Hebrew  idea  that  the  Messiah  was  to  be  a  pow- 
erful monarch  from  the  family  of  David,  with  a  proud 
dominion — for  all  his  disdain  of  domestic  splendor — 
expanded  "unto  the  ends  of  the  earth."  On  this  com- 
pare our  previous  note  18. 

(24).  That  the  second  advent  was  the  paramount 
end  of  his  Messianic  endeavor,  and  that  he  laid  on  it  the 
greatest  stress,  must  never  be  doubted.  This  point  can 
be  supported  by  the  most  convincing  N.  T.  evidences. 
It  is  true  that  his  present  activity  was  by  him  repre- 
sented   as    already    forming    part    of    the    impending 


100        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

stupendous  manifestation  of  liis  Messianic  government, 
at  liis  coming  again.  It  was  in  this  sense,  too,  that  he 
announced  the  kingdom  as  already  come  (see  Matt.  XII. 
28;  Luke  XVII.  21),  though  he  was  then  actually  but 
preparing  it.  Yet  it  is  open  to  no  question  that  the 
principal  proof  and  the  very  pith  of  Messianic  power 
and  glory  consisted  in  his  mind  in  the  event  of  his  Mess- 
ianic return,  which  he  was  all  along  sternly  avowing  as 
from  an  all-engrossing  motive  of  his  soul. 

(25).  See  on  this  important  point  Keim  (1.  c.  II. 
291  sq.  and  IV.  50  sq.).  He  proposes,  on  the  whole, 
that  at  an  earlier  phase  Jesus  announced  the  kingdom 
yet  as  future,  while  later,  when  success  had  strengthened 
his  position,  he  proclaimed  a  present  kingdom  (as  he 
declares  apparent  from  Matt.  IV.  lY  and  XII.  28);  also, 
that  Jesus  "kept  the  kingdom  suspended  between  the 
future  and  the  present."  This  view  may  commend 
itself  best  to  the  earnest  inquirer  who  seeks  to  form  an 
adequate  judgment  on  the  point  in  question. 

(26).  There  is  no  concealing  the  fact  that  there  is 
in  this  calling  away  of  disciples  from  their  families, 
which  meant  in  the  mind  and  words  of  Jesus  unques- 
tionably a  total  and  unconditional  self-surrender  to  him, 
a  marked  extremity  which  we  with  our  modem  habits  of 
mind  can  scarcely  estimate  aright.  It  is  best 
accounted  for  by  the  glow  of  his  Messianic  con- 
sciousness and  the  unflinching  determination  with 
which  he  pursued  his  Messianic  end.  To  these  mental 
and  emotional  conditions  is,  we  think,  also  attribut- 
able Jesus'  demand,  repeatedly  put  to  his  would-be 
followers,  to  dispossess  themselves  of  all  material 
goods,     that    they    might    acquire    a     claim    to    the 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     101 

kingdom  (or  to  "salvation  ;"  see  Matt.  XIX. 
25).  The  motive  for  sucli  demand  was  either 
that  they  would  secure  such  claim  by  the  merit  of 
the  voluntary  dispossession  itself  (as  it  is  very  difficult 
for  a  rich  man  to  enter  the  kingdom  of  heaven:  Matt. 
XIX.  23),  or  by  the  supererogation  of  selling  what  they 
had  and  giving  the  proceeds  to  the  poor.  The  latter 
motive  seems  to  have  been  predominant,  possibly  exclu- 
sive, in  Jesus'  thought,  whenever  he  urged  others  to  sell 
their  earthly  belongings  and  follow  him,  even  where  he 
did  not  expressly  mention  the  disposal  of  the  price  to  the 
poor,  as  we  find  it,  for  instance,  in  Matt.  XIII,  44. 
Here  the  advice  to  "give  to  the  poor"  may  have  to  be 
supplied  from  ch.  XIX.  21.  On  this  point,  most  inter- 
esting though  it  is,  we  cannot  dwell.  What  we  wish  to 
mark  here  particularly  is,  that  the  renunciation  of 
material  possessions  asked  by  Jesus  was  presumably  due 
to  the  same  ardent  Messianic  self-feeling  which  made 
him  obtain  followers  at  the  cost  of  severing  family  ties. 
Renan,  'Life  of  Jesus,'  speaks  of  this  as  "throwing 
down  defiance  to  nature."  In  whatever  light  we  may 
view  it,  we  have  to  admit  that  it  involved  a  grave  ques- 
tion. For,  as  already  above  noted,  the  abandonment  of 
families  commanded  the  disciples  by  Jesus  was  absolute 
and  unqualified  (see  especially  Luke  IX.  59-62).  It 
was,  too,  confessedly  accomplished  by  all  the  twelve 
apostles  (see  Matt.  XIX.  27).  Jesus  had  held  out  to 
them  for  such  sacrifice  the  transcendent  compensation 
that  they  would  be  his  coadjutors  at  the  Last  Judgment 
which  he  would  conduct  at  the  coming  'renewal'  of 
things.     Likewise  he  promised  exceeding  reward,  here 


102        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

and  hereafter,  to  every  follower  wlio  would  for  liis 
name's  sake  part  from  liis  nearest  of  kin  (ibid.  28,  29). 

The  position  Jesus  maintained  on  this  problem  was, 
that  the  disciple  must  own  no  other  relationship  but  to 
him,  and  that  affection,  undivided  and  undiverted,  was 
due  to  him  alone.  For  further  illustrations  marking  out 
Jesus'  temper  and  disposition  in  the  manner  of  acquiring 
disciples  we  refer  to  Luke  XIV,  26,  and  Matt.  XVI. 
24,  25.  To  this  range  of  sentiments  belong  also  the 
"strong  words" — the  phrase  is  Alford's — of  Matt.  VIII. 
22  (compare  Luke  IX.  59,  60),  and  likewise  Matt.  XIL 
46-50. 

(27.)  Fiirst  (1.  c.)  says  in  regard  to  the  "great 
threatening  oracle"  running  through  chapters  II-IV 
of  Isaiah :  "Framing  his  lofty  oracle  with  these  foreign 
(i.  e.  borrowed)  fragments  (viz.,  ch.  II.  2-4  and  IV.  2-6) 
as  prologue  and  epilogue,  Isaiah  mshed  to  keep  awake 
the  beautiful  theocratic  hopes  and  prospects,  to  console 
ftlic  people)  beforehand  on  the  imminent  judgment  he 
had  to  preach."  The  same  view  is  substantially  held  by 
Gesenius  (Commentary  on  Isaiah,  p.  173  ff.)  who  con- 
tends, moreover,  for  the  whole  intervening  oracle  being 
of  one  cast.  Reuss  too  ('History  of  the  Sacred  Writings 
of  the  O.  T.')  coincides  in  that  view.  He  summarily 
denotes  the  prologue  (ch.  II.  2-4)  as  the  "prospect  of  a 
peaceful  federation  of  the  nations  on  Mt.  Zion,"  and 
says  that  "this  perspective  recurs  again,  in  a  somewhat 
different  form,  at  the  end  (ch.  IV.  2  ff.).  The  "utter- 
ances between  those  bright  initial  and  final  passages," 
he  observes,  "were  depictions  of  the  moral  depravity  of 
the  present  which  deferred  the  coming  of  the  better 
times." 

Xow  as  to  verses  2-4  of  ch.  II.,  which  most  if  not 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     103 

all  expositors  regard  as  the  heading  of  the  following 
oration — and  we  ourselves,  too,  understood  it  so  in  the 
present  treatise — we  are  tempted  to  suggest  the  possi- 
bility that  they  were,  at  least  originally,  not  intended  as 
such  exordium,  but  as  the  ending  of  ch.  I.  In  the 
latter  part  of  this  chapter,  vv.  21-31,  a  ten'ible  chas- 
tisement is  denounced — though  it  pui'ports  to  be  a  par- 
tial one  only.  It  is  in  fierceness  comparable  to  that 
threatened  by  Micali  III.  12,  which  had  notoriously  (see 
Jer.  XX YI.  18)  struck  such  profound  dismay  into  the 
hearts  of  the  hearers.  (See  on  this  Stade,  1  c.)  It  is 
accordingly  quite  conceivable  that  the  prophet  or  his 
editor  chose  those  mitigating  words  of  promise  to  set 
them  off  against  the  previous  discourse  of  threatening. 
Let  us  say  here  that  such  proceeding  would,  on  the 
whole,  have  been  quite  in  keeping  with  the  general 
prophetic  wont.  This  was,  to  attach  words  of  conso- 
lation to  the  threatenings  they  were  impelled  to  pro- 
nounce. Even  Gesenius,  who,  as  above  noted,  holds 
that  the  passage  in  point  is  a  prologue,  remarks  other- 
wise, that  "the  Messianic  representations  ahvays  termi- 
nate, never  commence,  the  oracles;  and,  withal,  they 
stand  rarely  alone."  It  is  indeed  provable  from  many 
portions  of  the  prophetic  writings  that  it  was  with  them 
a  sort  of  canon  to  close  their  severe  monitions  and 
threatenings  with  some  consolatory  words.  We  will 
quote  one  parallel,  and  a  very  significant  one,  in  several 
respects.  It  is  Amos,  ch.  IX.  8,  15.  The  prophet 
threatens  Israel's  deportation  by  enemies  and  the 
destruction  of  the  wicked  of  them  in  the  exile,  but  holds 
out  also  a  happy  restoration  under  a  Davidic  king,  in 
whose  reign  prosperity  and  plenty  will  prevail.     Cer- 


104         The  Christmas  JSlotio,  and  the  Prophetic 

tainly,  tlie  supposition  must  here  be  supplied  from  a 
parallel  occurring  in  Micali  V.  6,  7,  that  the  exiled 
wicked  would  in  the  enemy's  country  fall  by  the 
sword,  so  that  the  restoration  would  be  the  lot  of  the 
deserving  remnant  only.  Yet  this  does  not  immedi- 
ately bear  on  the  point  we  wish  here  to  mark.  We 
aim  to  produce  one  out  of  many  evidences  illustrative 
of  what  may  safely  be  called  a  settled  motive  of  the 
prophets'  sentiment,  to  conciliate  on  the  spot  the  jarred 
feelings  of  the  hearers  to  whom  they  had  to  address 
themselves  with  gloomy  messages  of  impending  divine 
retribution.  But,  we  maintain,  it  was  with  them  not 
a  matter  of  sentiment  only.  It  was  part  of  their  mode 
of  reflection  and  line  of  thought  generally.  Hitzig 
remarks  most  properly  (in  his  commentary  on  Malachi), 
that  "the  prophetic  principle  was,  that  immediately 
upon  the  catastrophic  judg-ment  they  pronounced,  there 
would  ensue  the  Messianic  government." 

In  view  of  all  these  points  of  consideration  it  would 
appear  not  at  all  strange  if  the  verses  of  Isa.  II.  2-4  had 
originally  been  intended  as  the  close  of  ch.  I.  By  such 
construction  we  would,  too,  be  able  to  relieve  essentially 
the  sharp  contrast  of  those  verses  with  the  context, 
which  we  bring  forward  at  a  later  point  of  our  text  and 
pursue  there  with  that  logical  precision  which  a  close 
inquiry  into  those  prophecies  necessitates. 

As  the  prophet  had  in  his  oration  of  ch.  I.  21-31, 
clearly  and  distinctly  predicted  the  divine  chastisement 
as  inexorably  decreed  only  upon  the  irreclaimable 
wicked,  principally  the  unscrupulous  and  corrupt 
rulers  (ibid  24,  28);  as  he  had  expressly  indicated  in  v. 
25  (as  in  6h.  TV.  4)  a  sifting  judgment,  that  is,  one 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     105 

to  be  visited  on  the  supposably  incorrigible  class  only, 
while  he  held  out  exDressly  to  the  righteous  and  the 
penitent  middlings  that  they  would  be  spared  and  saved 
(v.  27):  it  would  seemingly  suit  so  much  better  to  take 
the  words  of  promise  which  are  now  found  in  ch.  II. 
2-4,  as  a  consolatory  appendage  to  the  preceding 
chapter. 

The  feelings  of  the  hearers,  who  almost  all  of  them 
belonged  doubtless  to  both  the  last-named  classes,  could 
not  have  been  seriously  jarred  by  the  denunciation  of  a 
judgment  which  would  not  be  visited  on  them  person- 
ally, as  the  prophet  had  declared  them,  some  directly, 
and  others  conditionally,  exempt  from  it.  They  could 
consequently  construe  the  words  of  promise  used  by  the 
prophet  immediately  afterwards,  as  affixed  for  their  own 
benefit,  and  even  take  them  in  the  sense  of  restriction 
to  their  own  enjoyment  (or  that  of  their  equally  deserv- 
ing posterity).  They  might  have  judged  so,  however 
general  a  stamp  of  national  prosperity  that  bright 
passage  of  promise  bears  in  an  independent  point  of 
view  and  from  its  unqualified  language  and  tone.  We 
hazard  the  entire  foregoing  hypothesis  and  submit  it 
for  the  judicious  pondering  of  those  interested  in  the 
subject. 

(28.)  Gesenius,  whom  we  may  confidently  follow 
as  one  of  the  most  scientific  and  at  the  same  time 
unbiased  commentators  of  Isaiah,  puts  chapter  I.  at 
the  time  of  the  ruinous  invasion  of  Judah  by  the 
armies  of  the  allied  kings  of  Israel  and  Syria,  738-734 
B.  C.  (Commentary,  p.  147).  Chapters  II.  and  III.  he 
dates  almost  with  it,  assuming  only  a  "somewhat  anterior 
time"  for  them  (ibid.  p.  176).     He  proposes  that  their 


106        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

contents  fit  alike  into  the  reign  of  Uzziah  and  Jotliam, 
and  also  into  the  earlier  years  of  Ahaz'  reign.  To  the 
latter  point  of  time  he  fixes  that  Syro-Israelitish  war  (p. 
268).  Even  chapter  V.  he  sets  down  as  synchronizing 
with  the  previons  ones.  The  incisive  threat  of  chastise- 
ment through  foreign  powers  set  forth  in  it  he  fitly  con- 
strues as  alluding  to  Assyria.  This  great-power  passed 
as  the  penal  instrument  appointed  by  Jehovah  to  visit  it 
upon  the  Judeans  for  their  irreligion  and  depravity.  He 
does  it  upon  the  analogy  of  ch.  VII.  20-25  and  VIII. 
6-8,  where  the  Assyrian  is  expressly  mentioned.  This 
great-power  was  to  him  supposably  implied  in  the 
prophet's  foreboding  of  ch.  V.  26-30. 

Let  us  say  that  it  becomes  all  the  more  likely  that 
the  prophet  had  in  ch.  V,  thought  of  Assyria  as  the 
power  which  was  to  inflict  the  penal  visitation  upon 
Judah,  as  we  learn,  further,  from  the  ve'hement 
expostulation  he  had  with  king  Ahaz  (ch.  VIL  17,  20- 
25),  that  that  foreign  power  was  in  those  days  upper- 
most in  his  mind.  In  the  last  place,  as  in  ch.  VIII. 
6-8,  it  is  expressly  designated.  The  threatened  warlike 
invasion  pictured  in  ch.  V.  did  indeed  not  oome  about. 
Assur  came  not  as  Judah's  foe  to  reduce  and  ruin  him. 
He  came  as  a  friend  to  offer  him  relief.  Yet  the  non- 
fulfillment of  that  threatening  does  not  signify  aught 
against  the  decided  prevalence  in  Isaiah's  mind  of  the 
grave  possibility  of  its  realization,  and  this  because  of 
his  clear  and  wise  insight  into  the  political  constellation 
of  that  time. 

29.  See  also  Sayce,  'The  Times  of  Isa.,'  p.  42, 
where  he  observes:  "Isaiah  was  not  very  old  before 
Judah   had  reason   to   know  that  a  new   and   terrible 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      107 

power  had  arisen  on  the  banks  of  the  Tigris."  He 
refers  to  the  presnmed  alliance  of  the  Judean  king 
Uzziah  with  Haniath,  in  742,  which  he  accepts  as  a 
certain  event;  compare  onr  note  30.  Cheyne,  'Introduc- 
tion to  the  Book  of  Isaiah/  says  (on  ch.  VII.): 
"Isaiah  came  forward  as  a  young  prophet  (according  to 
ch.  VI.  1)  in  the  year  of  the  death  of  Azaria'h,  that 
warlike  and  enterprising  monarch,  who  ventured  to 
defy  Ass\Tia  by  heading  a  confederacy  of  discontented 
Syrian  powers." 

(30).  Sayce,  'Life  and  Times  of  Isaiah,'  treats  of 
the  alliance  between  Uzziah  and  Hamatli  against 
Assyria,  in  the  reign  of  Tiglafch-Pileser  III.,  in  B.  C. 
742,  as  an  indubitable  fact  (p.  42).  So  do  some  other 
Assyriologists.  They  find  their  main  support  for  this 
historical  assumption  in  an  extant  cuneiform  inscription 
Avhich  has  been  discovered  intact  on  a  tablet  of  Tiglath- 
Pileser  himself.  From  it  they  decipher  the  name  of  the 
Judean  king  Azariah-Uzziah.  However,  Winckler 
('History  of  Israel  in  single  Essays,'  1895)  disputes  the 
identity  of  that  name  in  the  document,  and  declares  the 
conclusion  drawn  from  it  erroneous. 

Into  the  question  of  the  authenticity  or  probability 
of  the  entire  hypothesis  of  Uzziah's  coalition  with 
Hamath  against  Assyria,  we  cannot  enter,  nor  do  we 
feel  ourselves  competent  enough  to  deal  with  it.  Suffice 
it  to  observe  in  this  place  that  there  is  no  Biblical 
reference  for  it,  nor  any  chance  of  making  it  plausible 
from  any  portion  of  Hebrew  Scripture,  as  little  as  any 
Scriptural  support  can  be  brought  for  the  other  cunei- 
form account  of  Hezekiah's  coalition  with  Ashdod 
against  Assyria  in  the  reign  of  Sargon,  in  B.  C.  711. 


108        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

To  verify  these  suppositions  from  external  sources  which 
have  to  speak  for  themselves,  comes  within  the  province 
of  Assjriologists  only.  We  must  modestly  forbear  to 
decide  or  even  suggest  whether  they  can  stand  their 
ground  in  the  face  of  utter  Scriptural  silence.  It  may 
yet  be  noted  that  Sayce  gives  it  further  on  (p.  72),  that 
the  Judean  king,  Uzziah,  had  to  buy  Tiglath-Pileser  ofP 
'T^y  the  offer  of  submission  and  the  payment  of  tribute." 
That  the  issue  was  really  such  is  not  concurred  in  by 
some  other  Assyriologists.  We  judge  of  this  by  the 
remark  of  Hildebrandt,  in  his  excellent  monograph, 
'Judah's  Relation  to  Assyria  in  Isaiah's  Time,' p.  10.  He 
says  there — upon  the  authority  of  the  earlier  Assyriolo- 
gists— that  "king  Azariah  himself  was  not  subjected  to 
the  great-king." 

(31).  The  dread  of  the  Assyrian,  it  is  important  to 
notice,  was  in  the  air,  and  had  been  so  already  before 
Tiglath-Pileser's  campaign  of  B.  C.  734. 

See  Kuenen  on  Amos,  whose  prophetic  activity  he 
puts  at  B.  C.  760-750,  the  last  half  of  Jeroboam  II.'s 
reign.  He  explains  that  the  prophet's  prediction  of  a 
fearful  judgment  impending  on  Isreal,  alluded  to  the 
warlike  Assyrian  "approach"  to  Palestine  already  then 
attempted.  In  this  view  Robertson  Smith  ('The  Proph. 
of  Isr.,  p.  130)  also  coincides.  He  says:  "It  is  plain 
that  Amos  has  Assyria  in  his  mind,  though  he  never 
mentions  the  name.  It  is  no  unknown  danger  that  he 
foresees;  Assyria  was  fully  within  the  range  of  his 
political  horizon." 

(32).  We  are  not  alone  in  setting  out  emphatically 
the  harsh  contrast  of  Isa.  II.  2-4,  and  the  kindred 
prophetic    passages,     with    their    respective    contexts. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     109 

Kuenen  (1.  c.  p.  36-38)  urges  it  also,  though  only  in  a 
general  way.  "All  attempts/'  he  says,  "to  construe  a 
coherence  between  the  bright  picture  of  the  future  given 
in  those  verses  of  Isaiah  and  the  subsequent  denuncia- 
tions have  failed."  It  is  for  this  reason  that  he  assumes 
their  later  insertion  by  a  compiler  who,  as  he  further 
suggests,  gave  them  the  eminent  place  they  occupy  in 
the  transmitted  text,  in  the  supposition  that  they  came 
from  Isaiah,  and  attributed  to  them,  as  he  well  might, 
such  great  importance. 

It  is  this  scrutiny  of  Kuenen's  that  dealt  likewise 
with  a  similar  passage  of  promise  in  the  same  prophet. 
It  is  the  noted  and  often  discussed  prospect  of  restoration 
immediately  subsequent  upon  the  dismal  threatening  of 
Isa.  ch.  XXXII.  In  this  place  the  ruin  of  the  land  is 
pronoimced,  and  close  upon  it,  in  v.  15,  the  quickening 
hope  of  restoration,  by  miraculous  intervention,  is  held 
out.  This  is  to  Kuenen  too  incongruous  to  be 
tolerated,  if  an  Isaianic  origin  of  the  passage  were  to  be 
maintained.  To  meet  this  difficulty  he  fixes  upon  its 
different  authorship,  and  declares  it  as  spurious  (ibid, 
p.  81). 

Robertson  Smith  (1.  c.)  passes  lightly  over  this 
"mingling"  of  opposite  pictures  of  stern  rebuke  and 
bright  promise  of  "peace  and  felicity."  Commenting 
upon  Isa.  XXIX.-XXXII.,  which  chapters  bear  upon  the 
imminent  crisis  of  Sennacherib's  invasion  of  Judea,  he 
advances  this  sentiment:  "And  so  he  (Isaiah)  draws 
once  more  the  old  contrast  between  the  immediate  pros- 
pect of  a  land  desolated  by  invading  hosts and 

the  days  of  Israel's  restoration"  (the  latter  he  does  in 
ch.   XXXII.   15).     This  is,  we  own,   a  very  pleasant 


110        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

reflection.  But  we  liave  at  the  same  time  to  declare  it 
in  no  way  adequate  to  help  clearing  off  the  difficulty 
before  us.  It  is  too  uncritically  sentimental.  We  can 
not  hold  the  old  contrast  any  more  reasonably  justifiable 
than  the  new. 

In  an  interesting,  even  charming  way,  Greorge  Adam 
Smith  ('The  Book  of  Isaiah')  dilates  on  the  opposites  in 
question.  He  ascribes  the  lines  of  ch.  II.  1-5  to  Isaiah, 
the  Id<^alist,  and  ch.  II.  6 — IV.  1,  to  Isaiah,  the  Realist. 
He  says,  under  the  former  head,  that  it  is  peculiar  to 
"all  men  who  have  shown  our  race  how  great  things 
are  possible,"  that  they  "have  had  their  inspiration  in 
dreaming  of  the  impossible.  .  .  .  Isaiah  was  no  excep- 
tion to  this  human  fashion.  His  first  vision  was  that  of 
a  Utopia.  .  .  .  He  lifts  up  to  us  a  very  gTand  picture  of 
a  vast  commonwealth  created  in  Jerusalem.  .  .  .  The 
prophet's  own  Jerusalem  shall  be  the  light  of  the  world, 
the  school  and  temple  of  the  world;  the  seat  of  the  judg- 
ment of  the  Lord,  when  he  shall  reign  over  the  nations, 
and  all  mankind  shall  dwell  in  peace  beneath  Him.  It 
is  a  glorious  destiny.  .  .  It  seems  to  the  young  prophet's 
hopeful  heart  as  if  at  once  that  ideal  would  be  realized, 
as  if  by  his  own  word  he  could  lift  his  people  to  its  ful- 
fillment. But  that  is  impossible,  and  Isaiah  perceives 
so  as  soon  as  he  turns  from  the  far-off  horizon  to  the  city 
at  his  feet,  as  soon  as  be  leaves  to-morrow  alone  and 
deals  with  to-day.  The  next  verses  of  the  chapter — 
from  V,  6  onwards — stand  in  strong  contrast  to  those 
which  have  described  Israel's  ideal."  He  sets  forth 
these  contrasts  at  some  length,  and  then  brings  out  Isaiah 
under  the  other  head,  "The  Realist,"  in  reference  to  ch. 
11.  6-IV.  1. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      Ill 

!N^ow  while  we  have  to  accord  these  agreeable  lines 
the  merit  of  unusual  suggestiveness,  it  is,  on  the  other 
hand,  plain  that  they  do  not  help  us  in  any  way  over  the 
grave  difficulty  of  the  opposites  of  sense  afforded  in  the 
orations  of  Isaiah  under  discussion.  It  is  impossible  for 
us  to  improve  his  distinction  between  ideal  and  real,  as 
we  have  to  deal  with  the  positive  contrast  confronting  us 
there.  We  cannot  possibly  and  sensibly  say,  that 
Isaiah's  mood  and  tendency  of  mind  were  to-day,  when 
he  gave  forth  the  piercing  denunciations,  overcome  by 
the  impression  of  present  sad  realities,  and  to-morrow 
again  elated  to  the  eminences  of  ideal  vision.  It  is 
utterly  inconceivable  that  one  is  at  a  certain  period  of 
his  life  both  an  idealist  and  realist  within  a  few 
days  apart  from  one  another.  This  is  not  borne  out  by 
the  experience  of  men. 

We  know  of  no  reasonable  means  by  which  those 
contrary  utterances  could  be  reconciled,  so  long  as  they 
continue  in  their  delivered  sequence  to  be  credited  to  the 
prophets  under  whose  literary  names  they  appear.  Even 
the  expedient  of  finding  a  mitigation  of  such  contrast 
in  the  theory  that  the  promise  of  a  brilliant  national 
future  applies  only  to  a  saved  remnant  after  the  threat- 
ened doom  will  have  been  executed,  does  in  our  view 
not  hold,  at  least  not  in  regard  to  expressions  such  as  are 
used  in  Isa.  II.  2-4,  and  the  like  prophetic  oracles  (see  on 
this,  our  text).  In  that  passage  of  Isaiah  a  gorgeous 
outlook  for  the  future  is  wedged  in  between  penal 
denunciations  and  the  threat  of  a  judgment  to  be  visited 
on  the  Judeans.  That  the  prophet  meant  every  word 
he  spoke,  is  not  to  be  doubted.  The  language  he  used 
is  too  marked  to  be  mistaken.     The  best  commentators 


112        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Provhetic 

are  agreed  upon  this.  There  is  a  settled  consensus 
among  them  that  Isaiah  had  firmly  rooted  in  his  mind 
the  necessary  infliction  of  a  penal  calamity  on  his  com- 
patriots by  the  mighty  Assyrian  ever  since  the  reign  of 
Ahaz,  and  down  to  the  time  of  Sennacherib's  invasion. 

It  is  in  particular  Stade  ('History,  etc.')  who  asserts 
in  the  most  positive  manner  that  Isaiah's  and  Micah's 
conviction  until  then  was,  that  the  fatal  day  of  visitation 
would  irrevocably  befall  the  land  and  its  capital. 
Similarly  Sayce  and  Robertson  Smith  assume.  The 
latter  says,  that  "Isaiah  alone  (of  all  the  other  non- 
prophetic  Judean  people)  was  during  these  thirty 
years  (which  elapsed  since  his  notable  interview  with 
king  Ahaz)  assured  that  no  combination  could  stem 
the  tide  of  (Assyrian)  conquest."  And  it  is  in  view  of 
this  indisputable  circumstance  of  the  prophet's  sure 
foreboding  of  that  eventuality,  which  clasihes,  however, 
so  very  sharply  with  his  alleged  coextensive  promise  of 
a  golden  era  coming,  that  we  dwell  in  our  treatise  so 
decidedly  upon  the  proposition  that  that  bright  passage, 
like  the  similar  ones  of  other  Hebrew  poetic  preachers, 
is  well-nigh  rendered  of  no  effect,  nay  meaningless, 
either  in  an  historical,  exegetical,  or  dogmatic  respect. 

The  same  objection  holds  of  the  contrast  in  Micah 
lY.  1-4,  a  contrast  against  which  Stade  objects,  as 
already  noted  elsewhere,  that  it  is  "utterly  improbable 
that  the  prophet  should  have  weakened  the  impression 
of  his  oracle  of  ch.  III.  12  by  another  of  just  the  con- 
trary import.  Kuenen  (1.  c.)  attempts  to  meet  Stade's 
objection  by  distinguishing  between  the  written  and  the 
spoken  word  of  Micah.  He  frankly  owns  that  if  the 
oration  were  to  be  set  down  as  a  spoken  one  it  would 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      113 

certainly  have  to  be  declared  self-contradictory.  Yet 
he  claims  that  the  prophet  only  committed  it  to  writing, 
and  this  makes  the  difference  as  to  the  weight  of  that 
contrast.  He  reasons  thus  :  ''It  is  impossible  that 
Micah  should  have  stopped  short  at  the  threatened  fall 
of  Jerusalem,  viz.,  in  ch.  III.  12.  He  necessarily  must 
also  have  given  voice  to  the  expectations  he  cherished 
for  the  future."  We  cannot  but  wonder  at  such  feeble 
argument  produced  by  that  eminent  critic,  as  well  as 
at  his  most  arbitrary  distinction  between  those  oracles 
of  the  prophet.  Where  has  he  found  it  certified,  or 
how  can  he  even  make  it  probable? 

Before  we  close  this  argument  we  remark,  that  the 
Messianic  hopers  of  aU  ages  were  apparently  never 
troubled  by  the  contrast  of  l^ose  prophetic  utterances. 
The  strict  and  unquestioning  aTHi^erence  to  the  notion 
that  the  Messiah  was  yet  to  come  at  some  future  time 
according  to  a  pretended  plan  of  Providence  for  Israel, 
shuts  out  any  critical  inquiry  into  relative  texts.  So 
it  was  in  old  time  and  in  the  Middle  Ages,  and  so  it  is 
yet  among  the  oppressed  Jews  of  the  world  generally. 
Those  clinging  to  the  Messianic  hope  would  never  dare 
to  approach  analytically  the  essence  of  this  problem, 
nor  be  put  out  by  the  uncertain  or  questionable  pass- 
ages of  Scripture,  which  have  been  traditionally  fixed 
as  designating  that  hazy  creation  of  old  Israelitish  fancy. 

As  illustrative  of  this  position,  we  will  quote  a  few 
observations  from  the  commentary  of  Ibn  Ezra  on 
Isaiah.  This  great  Toledan  of  the  twelfth  century 
C.  E.,  who  is  mostly  famous  as  grammarian  and 
Scripture  commentator,  treats  the  noted  passage  of  Isa. 
II.   2-4,   in  this  wise.     He  lays  down   as  premiss  the 


114:         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

assTirance  that  in  the  "after  days"  of  v.  2,  reference  can 
be  bnt  to  the  future  "days  of  Messiah"  proper.  That 
the  prophet  could  have  held  in  mind  no  other,  previous 
period  as  the  subject  of  his  forecast,  appears,  he  reasons, 
from  the  "fact  that  there  never  was  a  time  after  Isaiah 
in  Avhich  the  Israelites  were  not  subject  to  the  ill  fate 
of  Avarfare,  carried  on  against  them.  For  it  is  variously 
recorded  that  even  all  along  the  Second  Polity  of  Israel, 
such  warfare  had  not  ceased." 

And  here  he  brings  forward  in  a  sort  of  satiric 
humor:  "Even  our  text  itself  bears  witness  to  this 
circumstance,  for  it  says  (v.  4),  "and  they  (viz.,  the 
Gentile  nations)  will  not  learn  war  any  more."  What 
this  piquant  and  enigmatic  commentator  wished  to  con- 
vey here  is  not  difficult  to  make  out.  He  imdoubtedly 
aimed  to  impute  to  that  expression — though  scarcely  in 
exegetical  earnest — the  sense  that  "they  (the  Gentiles) 
will  (or  do)  not  need  to  learn  war  any  more,"  just 
because  they  were  keeping  themselves  in  continual 
practice  of  it  (in  their  hostility  against  Israel).  That 
such  constraction  is  not  really  in  the  spirit  of  the 
prophet's  phraseology,  and  that  it  cannot  in  the  least  be 
taken  to  bear  such  meaning,  is  patent  enough,  and  was 
imquestionably  as  clear  to  Ibn  Ezra  as  it  is  to  us. 
Yet  he  found  it  suitable  and  gTatifying  to  his  gloomy 
Israelitish  mood,  and  thought  it  congenial  to  other 
Scriptural  inquirers  for  whom  he  wrote  his  commen- 
tary, to  tinge  his  exposition  with  a  pathetic  allusion  to 
the  hapless  fate  of  Israel  in  the  past  and  as  well  in 

his  own  days. 

(33).     As  most  instructive  in  regard  to  the  question 
of    discriminating    divine    judgment    in    the    prophetic 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     115 

literature,  we  have  to  name  the  book  of  Amos.  It 
affords  interest  to  follow  this  prophet  through  ch.  v. 
27,  VI.  14,  VIII.  8,  where  his  denunciation  appears  jet 
in  a  general  tone,  to  ch.  IX.,  in  which  the  destruction  of 
the  wicked  Israelites  is  pronounced  and  the  rescue  of 
the  better  ones  at  the  same  time  judiciously  guarded. 
Yet  his  conclusion  was,  that  the  catastrophe  of  the  fall 
of  the  Ephraimite  State  with  an  attending  woeful  cap- 
tivity was  divinely  determined  and  had  inevitably  to 
befall  the  good  along  with  the  impious.  Even  the 
restorative  means  of  gTace,  national  repentance,  seems 
to  have  passed  in  his  mind  as  unavailable  at  that 
advanced  stage  of  gTiiltiness.  The  implication  of  ch. 
VIII.  9,  10,  at  least  appears  to  be,  that  God  would  not 
allow  any  more  that  the  catastrophe,  penally  incurred, 
should  somehow  be  eventually  averted.  (See  on  this 
Hitzig,  in  loco;  also  Robertson  Smith,  I.  c,  p.  141.) 

For  the  period  of  the  Exile,  Ezekiel,  ch.  XX.,  is  very 
illustrative  on  the  point  of  Divine  discriminating  pro- 
cedure. The  prophet  teaches  a  very  close  judicial 
separation  in  vv.  34-38.  The  same  idea  is  bodied  forth 
in  the  Second  Isaiah,  ch.  LXV;    LXVI.  24. 

A  like  line  of  thought  and  teaching  appears  in  the 
still  later  prophet,  Malachi.  In  him  the  additional 
element  of  a  "refining"  procedure  is  brought  forth. 
This  judicial  test  is  to  be  applied  to  each  individual 
[Levite]  (ch.  III.  2,  3;  compare  Zech.  XIII.  9),  whilst 
a  most  crushing,  dread  judgment  awaits  the  (irreclaim- 
able) wicked. 

There  is  in  all  those  cited  prophetic  passages  matter 
for  further  thought,  which  we  can,  however,  not  pursue 
in  these  pages. 


116        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

(34).  The  notion  that  Isa.  II.  2-4  (  and  likewise 
Micah  IV.  1-4),  were  inserted  by  a  later  compiler  of  the 
chapters  from  II.  onwards,  is  represented  by  Kuenen 
(1.  c.  p.  36-38).  Their  composition  he  ascribes  to  an 
older  contemporary  of  Isaiah  and  Micah. 

Cheyne,  who,  with  a  number  of  other  more  recent 
'higher  critics,'  declares  it  "imprudent  to  defend  the 
antiquity  of  the  passage,"  has  concluded  to  attribute  it 
to  an  editor  of  Isaiah,  and  one  who  lived  after  the  Exile. 
The  authorship  itself  he  fixes  as  the  "work  of  a  post- 
Exilic  imitator  of  the  older  prophets"  (Tntrod.  to  the 
Book  of  Isa.'). 

Similarly  Stade  judges  (in  Zeitschr.,  1881,  as  above). 
Yet,  while  he  disallows  positively  lihe  old  date  of  the 
Assyrian  epoch,  he  is  not  so  dogmatic  about  the  lateness 
of  its  origin.  He  cannot  decide  as  to  this  question,  but 
inclines  to  an  indefinite  date  of  its  writing  and  incor- 
poration, holding  it  possible  that  it  succeeded  the  life- 
time of  Ezekiel,  but  no  less  possible  that  it  may  have  to 
be  put  earlier. 

(35).  It  is  proper  to  remark  that  if  our  proposition, 
presented  in  note  27,  should  hold,  the  contraries  of  the 
gloom  of  denunciation  and  glow  of  promise,  closely 
joined  to  one  another  in  Isaiah's  oration,  could  be  recon- 
ciled without  much  difiiculty.  This  proposition  is,  that 
the  vers^  2-4,  were  an  epilogue  to  the  antecedent 
chapter.  Having  discussed  it  there  at  some  length,  we 
need  only  briefly  refer  to  it  here. 

(36).  Where  righteousness  is  the  guiding  principle, 
there  peace  must  necessarily  result  or  subsist,  as  the  same 
prophet  has  so  beautifully  said  in  ch.  XXX.  17,  "and 
the  outcome  of  righteousness  will  be  peace."     The  ideal 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     117 

king  will  go  forth  to  govern,  "girded  with,  righteous- 
ness" (ch.  XL  5).  Thus  he  will  not  need  to  smite  with 
the  sword.  His  mere  word  will  be  the  rod  of  rule, 
and  as  well  of  chastisement  of  the  refractory  element. 
His  mere  breath  \vill  penally  strike  down  the  incorrigible 
evildoer  (v.  4).  This  is,  truly,  totally  different  from  the 
ordinary  human  discipline.  It  is  a  sort  of  supernatural 
judicature.  But  then  is  not  the  illustrious  vicegerent 
of  Jehovah  otherwise  divinely  gifted?  Will  he  not 
possess  the  divine-like  capacity  of  not  having  to  judge 
by  appearance  or  decide  upon  auricular  evidence,  but 
be  able  to  unravel,  with  penetrating  insight  into  the  very 
core  of  the  accused,  the  clear  and  true  facts  of  each 
criminal  charge?  (v.  3;  compare  1  Sam.  XVI.  7). 
And  surely — as  we  have  to  infer  from  the  cognate  and, 
as  we  think  it  indisputable,  also  connate  passage,  ch.  IX. 
5,  6, — the  prophet  must  have  wished  to  apply  this  sort  of 
immaterial  procedure  of  the  ideal  Anointed  to  his  ex- 
ternal judicature  as  well.  As  his  sovereign  sway  is 
"unlimited,"  all  the  other  nations  will  be  amenable  to 
his  world-tribunal  located  in  the  Judean  capital,  Jeru- 
salem, where  he  will  execute  justice  to  them  in  the  same 
spiritual  manner  in  which  he  judges  his  own  people. 

It  will  be  pertinent  to  add  here  the  remark  that  the 
apocalyptic  IV.  Ezra  has  given  forth  the  sentiment, 
that  the  Messiah  will  need  no  arms,  but  be  able  to  des- 
troy whole  armies  of  enemies  arrayed  in  battle  against 
him,  with  his  fiery  breath,  and  the  flames  and  sparks 
shooting  from  his  lips  and  tongue.  It  admits  of  no 
question  that  the  Isaianic  expression  of  ch.  XL  4,  under- 
lies that  mystical  writer's  Messianic  description.  He 
elaborated   it,   putting   in   the   effective   stroke   of   the 


118        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

spiritual  ^mitrailleuse.'  It  is,  we  are  yet  to  observe,  a 
fact  wliicli  must  strike  every  inquirer  into  the 
apocalj'ptic  books  of  Enoch  and  IV.  Ezra,  that  both 
these  "writers  drew  substantially  from  oh.  XL  of  Isaiah, 
which  served  as  a  model  for  ^far-off'  mystical  imagery 
to  other  old  inquirers  as  well. 

(37).  The  Second  Isaiah  has  borrowed  the  image 
of  the  pacification  of  the  brutes  in  the  blessed  future, 
in  ch.  LXV.  25.  Yet  he  left  out  the  second  clause  of 
V.  9,  "for  the  earth  shall  be  full  of  the  knowledge  of  the 
Lord,  as  the  waters  cover  the  sea."  About  this  omis- 
sion we  bring  no  complaint.  On  the  contrary,  it  seems 
quite  proper.  For  in  connection  with  the  brutes,  it  can 
easily  be  seen,  the  knowledge  (and  acknowledgment) 
of  God  is  not  readily  conceivable.  The  only  acceptable 
sense  of  this  connection  would  appear  to  be  that  in  which 
Delitzsch  (Commentary,  in  loco,)  construes  it,  viz.,  that 
Jehovah  will  in  that  happy  and  glorious  Messianic  future 
turn  the  fierce  temper  of  all  the  noxious  beasts,  as  their 
quality  of  doing  injury  as  a  penal  visitation  upon  sinners 
will  then  not  be  needed  any  more,  the  presumption  being 
that  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  "land"  (of  Israel)  will 
"know"  him  and,  consequently,  serve  him  with  steadfast 
purpose.  But  this  is,  we  object,  too  forced  a  meaning. 
The  second  clause,  taken  as  an  explanation  of  the  first 
in  such  indirect  bearing,  is  thus  not  at  all  plain.  It 
needs  a  philosophical  interpreter  to  make  its  sense  clear. 
The  prophet,  we  hold,  cannot  reasonably  be  supposed  to 
have  spoken  thus  enigmatically. 

The  more  natural  implication  would  indeed  be,  that 
God  would  at  that  future  happy  time  infuse  a  certain 
degree  of  intellect  and  suitable  understanding  into  the 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     119 

nature  of  the  animals,  so  that  they  would  by  their  own 
discretion  live  in  peace  mutually  and  towards  men.  But 
why,  then,  express  such  improvement  of  the  rudimentary 
animal  intelligence  under  the  phrase  of  "knowing 
Jehovah?"  And  yet  there  seems  no  alternative  but  to 
take  the  whole  picture  of  animal  pacification  in  this 
point  of  view.  Jehovah  would  then  be  represented  as 
newly  capacitating  the  brutes  to  comprehend  his  will, 
which  would  be,  that  they  should  all  be  tame  and  mild 
and  do  no  more  hurt  of  any  kind. 

That  this  sense  is  not  so  foreign  to  an  old  prophet,  is 
shown  by  the  analogue  of  the  prophet  Hosea.  He  holds 
out  to  Israel  a  period  of  blissful  restoration  coming,  in 
which  they  would  live  again  secure  and  free  from  fear. 
God  would  eventually  not  only  "break  the  battle"  with 
its  deadly  instruments  "out  of  the  land,"  but  also  "make 
a  covenant"  for  the  behoof  of  re-accepted  Israel  "with 
the  beasts  of  the  field,  etc.,"  that  is,  bind  them,  as  it 
were,  by  oath  to  abstain  from  every  injury  to  his  people 
(ch.  II.  20).  In  the  figurative  language  of  Scripture, 
this  means  that  Jehovah  ^^dll  not  only  transfoi-m,  by  his 
creative  and  fashioning  power,  the  violent  nature  of  the 
wild  beasts  into  a  milder  one,  but  will  even  personally 
interpose  his  address  to  them  and  direct  them  how  they 
shall  henceforth  conduct  themselves.  That  Jehovah 
does  not  reject  such  mode  of  approaching  animals  for 
certain  ends  of  his  government  and  providence,  can  be 
supported  by  various  Scriptural  examples. 

Upon  the  point  of  the  many  parallels  in  external 
literature  of  features  of  the  gentle,  peaceable,  even 
friendly  disposition  of  animals  in  idyllic  pictures  of  the 
golden  age  past  and  expected  to  be  again,  also  those 


120        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

still  more  fabulous  ones  of  a  golden  age  ever  present — 
at  the  distant  terrestrial  Islands  of  the  Blessed — we 
cannot  dwell,  however  desirable  it  might  be  to  do  so. 

(38).  For  this,  by  the  way,  there  was  a  scant  pros- 
pect. The  exile  of  the  masses  from  the  ruined  kingdom' 
of  Israel  was  then  already  accomplished.  It  was  not 
at  all  likely  that  the  all-powerful  Assyrian  would  give  up 
the  Israelitish  captives  at  the  mandate  of  any  Messianic 
ruler  of  Jerusalem. 

(39).  Kuenen  (1.  c.  p.  53)  remarks,  too,  that  the 
prospective  sanguine  vengeance  upon  Israel's  hostile 
neighbors  "ill  harmonizes  with  Isaiah's  uniformly  ideal 
^perception  of  the  future." 

(40).  Oheyne,  The  Prophets  of  Isr.,  (1895),  brings 
forward  the  two  possible  alternatives  of  meaning  to  be 
put  on  Isaiah's  description  of  the  everlasting  perman- 
ence of  the  domination  of  Messiah:  the  one,  that  he 
would  have  "an  uninterrupted  succession,"  and  the 
other,  that  he  would  be  "immortal."  He  inclines  to  the 
latter  construction,  as  being  "more  in  accordance  with 
the  general  tenor  of  the  description."  We  cannot  go 
along  with  him  in  this  estimate.  It  is  true,  Isaiah  has  in 
both  places,  here  and  in  ch.  XI.,  given  to  the  portraiture 
of  Messiah  transcendent  enough  colors.  One  expression 
at  least,  as  to  the  ideal  king's  name,  is  positively  too 
exorbitant  a  sublimation  to  be  countenanced  even 
in  a  prophet,  viz.,  "the  mighty  God"  (or  "a  mighty 
God").  And  it  is  only  in  this  view,  too,  that 
we  may  partially  allow  for  it,  that  it  is,  namely,  but 
metaphorical  and  applied  simply  to  the  name  and  not 
the  nature  of  Messiah.  Yet  against  the  assumption 
that  the  Messiah's  immortality,  that  is,  his  undying  state 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     121 

on  earth,  was  intended  in  oiu*  passage,  there  stand  out, 
first,  numerous  instances  in  Scripture  in  which  the  ever- 
lasting endurance  of  a  Hebrew  monarch  on  his  terres- 
trial throne  is  asserted,  all  of  which  can  imply  only  an 
endless  succession  in  his  family.  Again,  we  can,  for  all 
Isaiah's  extravagant  designation  of  the  ideal  king's 
qualities  and  dignity,  never  bring  ourselves  to  suppose 
for  one  moment  that  he  aimed  to  represent  him  as  really 
to  be  transformed  from  a  human  into  a  supernal  being, 
with  the  unnaturally  distinct  prerogative  of  having  an 
undying  nature.  Lastly,  we  hold  it  inconceivable  that 
Isaiah  should,  even  for  once,  have  set  himself  against  the 
organic  conception  and  fundamental  principle  of 
Hebrew  Scripture,  which  is,  that  every  man,  however 
high  or  holy,  must  die:  see  Gen.  III.  19,  22;  Ps. 
LXXXIX.  49.  This  principle  stands  too  strongly  and 
decidedly  in  the  way  of  taking  Isa.  IX.  6,  as  indicative 
of  immortality,  were  it  even  otherwise  admissible  to  give 
it  such  a  meaning.  It  alone  would  be  enough  to  con- 
fute Cheyne's  so  very  singular  preference  of  interpre- 
tation. 

We  are  yet  to  remark  that  the  question  of  later, 
apocalyptic  apprehensions  of  the  Messiah's  deathless 
immortality  on  earth,  cannot  enter  into  the  rational  con- 
sideration of  an  old  prophetic  expression  like  Isa.  IX. 
6.  On  this  point  we  cannot  enlarge.  For  details  on  it 
we  refer  to  the  significant  passage  of  John  XII.  32; 
also  Volkmar's  'Introd.  to  the  Apocr.,'  II.,  IV.  Ezra, 
p.  398,  and  Langen,  'Judaism  in  Palestine  in  the  Time 
of  Christ,'  p.  416. 


122         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 


EXCUESUS. 


While  on  tlie  subject  of  prophetic  enthusiasm  and 
excitement  of  brightest  hope  for  the  national  future  of 
Israel  at  particular  auspicious  points  of  time  in  their 
history,  it  occurred  to  us  that  as  a  most  suitable  instance 
the  passage  of  Isa.  IX.  1-6  may  be  noted.  As  great 
importance  has  ever  been  attached  to  this  passage  by 
Messianic  inquirers,  we  deem  it  proper  to  reflect  upon 
it  at  length,  that  we  may  draw  from  it  such  pertinent 
illustration  as  a  rational  apprehension  of  its  entire  text 
may  enable  us. 

As  to  the  vexed  question  what  personage  the  prophet 
may  have  alluded  to,  we  freely  declare  that  it  is  to  us 
satisfactorily  enough  settled.  We  hold  it  incontestably 
certain  that  the  prophet  thought  of  none  other  than 
king  Hezekiah.  The  other  point,  what  immediate 
occasion  and  time  may  have  inspired  those  lines,  is  not 
so  easy  of  solution.  Let  us  say  that  an  interesting  key 
to  it  has  been  furnished  in  a  meritorious  monograph 
written  by  Hildebrandt,  ^Judah's  Relations  to  Assyria  in 
Isaiah's  Time,'  1874.  jSTow  wdiile  we  will  ultimately  dis- 
agree with  him  on  the  chief  part  of  his  hypothesis,  viz., 
that  the  noted  passage  was  written  not  long  after  king 
Hezekiah's  accession,  and  that  the  exultant  lines  of 
verse  3  had  direct  reference  to  his  revolt  against  Assyria, 
yet  his  suggestions  are  so  very  striking  and  applicable 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     123 

in  spirit  that  we  ma}^  safeh^  reproduce  tlieni  in  tlie  main 
for  the  purpose  of  the  desirable  illustration.  Moreover, 
we  mil  subsequently  adduce  the  remarks  of  a  distin- 
guished theological  scholar  which  accord  with  his  senti- 
ments on  the  point  we  wish  to  bring  out  in  this  place. 
Hildebrandt  has  gone  critically  into  the  modernly  dis- 
covered and  improved  Ass}T.'ian  sources,  by  the  aid  of 
which  he  endeavored  to  set  right  various  doubtful  or 
conflicting  accounts  of  the  Biblical  record.  Hezekiah's 
revolt  *  is  by  him,  ajs  by  most  Assyriologist  interpreters 

*Tli'at  this  was  the  first  actual  revolt  of  Heziebiah  ruuiy  be 
taken  for  granted  on  the  strength  of  this  argument  of  Kuenen's 
alone  ('Introduction  to  the  Books  of  the  O.  T.',  II.  p.  30  ff.  and 
p.  53),  that  'there  is  in  the  numerous  inscriptions  from  Sargon's 
time  but  one  that  mentions  'Judiah,'  and  this  means  nothing 
else  than  the  Judean  king's  vassialage  to  Assyria,  but  not  his 
reduction  by  force  of  arms.  Had  this  been  accomplished  there 
would,  as  that  writer  most  seusibly  argues,  have  certainly 
been  left  a  trace  of  it  in  those  numerous  Assyrian  documents. 
But  this  is  not  the  ease.  Kuenen  maintains  this  position  ex- 
pressly against  Cheyne  ('Prop'hecies  of  Isaia'h')  who,  he  says, 
"assumes  wrongly  that  Hezekiah  had  been  at  war  with  Sar- 
gon."  Stade  too  ('History  of  the  People  of  Israel')  holds  that 
Hezekiah  was,  from  the  silence  of  Assyrian  inscriptions  about 
Palestinian  affairs  in  the  reign  of  Sargon,  acquiescent  under 
this  greait-king.  Amomg  more  recent  Assyriologists,  Winckler 
('History  of  Israel  in  single  Essays'  p.  182)  contends  however 
for  a  general  Palestinian  uprising,  and  one  lasting  for  three 
years,  from  B.  C.  713  to  711.  It  was  headed  by  the  Phitistian 
state  of  Ashdod.  He  infers— making  ibis  own  interpretation 
of  respective  Assyrian  data  (p.  224),  that  all  Philistia,  Judah, 
Edom  and  JNIoab  bad  joined  in  the  Ashdod  revolution.  He 
assigns  it  as  fomented  by  a  domestic  Egyptian  party.  Heze- 
kiah, he  advances,  "could  not  resist  either  the  temptation  or 
coei'cion  to  take  part  in  the  insun^ection  undertaken  in  the 
trust  in  Egyptian  succor."  Sayce  too,  in  'The  Times  of  Isaiah,' 
assumes  a  Sargonic-Judean  conflict  in  B.  C.  711,  despite  the 


124        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

of  the  respective  circumstances,*  connected  witli  the 
time  of  Sennacherib's  accession,  B.  C.  705.  It  was 
after  the  assassination  of  his  father  and  predecessor,  the 
great-king  Sargon,  that  many  vassal  states  east,  north 
and  south  moved  sympathetically  to  revolt  from  Assyria 
and  throw  off  the  chafing  yoke  of  tributary  dependence 
upon  it.  The  reduction  of  Merodach-Baladan,  of 
Babylon,  had  occupied  Sennacherib's  activity  till  about 
B.  C.  701,  when  be  decided  to  mardh  forward  to  south- 
western Asia  to  re-subject  the  revolted  countries.f     He 

utter  silence  about  it  in  the  Hebrew  records.  He  iavenits 
an  allusion  to  it  in  chapter  X.  and  XI.  of  Isaiah.  Tlie 
prophecy  of  these  chapters  he  conu'ectures  as  haTing  been 
called  forth  by  Sargon's  supposed  movement  against  Jerusa- 
lem. Pursuantly  to  this  hypothesis  ihe  'has  to  propose  an  alter- 
ation of  the  text  of  2  Kings  XVIII.  13,  where  "the  twenty- 
fourth  year"  is  to  be  substituted  for  "'the  fourteenth  lyear." 
We  cannot  here  enter  upon  a  diseusstion  of  this  entire  ihypoth- 
esis  of  that  great  English  scholar.  Eobertso'n  Smith  (1.  c.  p. 
296,  sq.)  brings  very  valid  arguments  against  it,  proving  Its 
"extreme  improbability." 

A  sort  of  middle  view  is  upheld  by  Rawlinson  (as  above), 
who  leaves  it  uncertain  "whether  Hezeliiah  was  engaged  per- 
sonally in  this  war."  Yet  he  accredits  the  relative  Assyrian 
inscription  isufflciently  to  judge  therefrom  that  Hezeliiah 
"appears  to  have  (then)  been  prepared  to  cast  ofiC  the  Assyrian 
yoke."  He  decides,  though,  that  "it  seems  most  probable  that 
there  was  no  actual  conflict  between  Assynia  and  Judaea 
until  after  the  accession  of  iSennaoherib"  (p.  187). 

*See  also  Winckler,  1.  c. 

t  Whether  or  how  far  Egypt  had  abetted  and  co-operated 
in  this  wide-ispread  anti- Assyrian  uprising  is  regarded 
disputable  by  Winckler,  ibid.  p.  97.  Other  writers,  among 
them  Rawlinson  and  Stade,  consider  it  unquestionable 
that  Egypt  had  actively  and  eagerly  joined  in  the  gen- 
eral movement  against  Assyria.  Tihe  latter  writer  holds 
firmly  that  back  of  all  these  Palestinian  states  was  Egypt, 
which  had  in  B.  C.  704  got  in  Tirhakah  an  energetic  ruler. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      125 

made  war  upon  Phoenicia,  Pliilistia,  and,  lastly,  Judea. 
King  Hezekiali  is  presumed  to  have  led  this  western 
revolution  (so  Stade,  Winckler  and  others).^ 

N^ow  Hildebrandt  advances  the  proposition  that 
Hezekiah,  who  was  so  surpassingly  celebrated  by  the 
prophet  Isaiah,  having  awakened  great  rejoicing  among 
the  pious  Judeans  by  his  vigorous  undoing  of  the  mis- 
chief his  idolatrous  father,  Ahaz,  had  %vrought  in  the 
country,  made  also  the  devout  prophet's  heart  "exult 
loudly  over  this  great  triumph  of  Jehovah,  who  had  by 
his  grace  made  an  end,  even  without  striking  a  blow,  of 
the  thirty  years'  ser\dtude  (to  Assyria),  and  thirty  years' 
idolatry,"  He  lets  the  prophet  utter,  in  his  rapturous 
estimate  of  his  august  friend's  coming  government,  the 
famous  lines  'of  Isa.  IX.  1-6,  which  held  out  the  glorious, 
blissful  era  at  hand,  of  which  former  poet-preachers 
had  dreamt  and  which  had  doubtless  become  tradi- 
tionally settled  as  an  invaluable  oracle  of  bright  and 
lofty  re-assurance  for  the  future.  That  blessed  far-off 
event,  marked  in  the  prophecy  of  Isa.  II.  2-4,  was  or 
was  about  to  be  realized  now.  The  bliss  of  the  four 
Messianic  p's,  peace,  prosperity  and  proud  power,  was  in 
the  prophet's  vision  really  attained  with  the  reign  of  the 
marvellously  God-endowed  Judean  king.  To  such  a 
high  pitch  of  happy  anticipation  the  prophet's  imagina- 
tion was  raised! 

But,  alas,  he  became  very  soon — according  to  Hilde- 
brandt, who  puts  Hezekiah's  revolt  indefinitely  between 
B.  C.  705  and  701 — sorely  disappointed  in  his  fond  and 
brilliant  vision.  To  his  poignant  regret  he  had  found 
out  that  idealistic  longing  was  one  thing,  but  that  an  all- 
powerful   over-lord's  practical,   summary   dealing  with 


126         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Pronhetic 

a  rebellious  vassal  was  quite  another.  Instead  of  glori- 
ous independence  from  Assyria  and  a  firm  establishment 
of  Jehovah's^  theocratic  government  in  Jierusalem,  con- 
ducted bj  his  vicegerent,  the  Davidic  world-eraperor, 
with  the  Judean  capital  as  the  center  of  gravity  for 
univei'sal  rule  and  universal  direction  of  affairs,  there 
came  a  sadly  blighted  hope.  Hezekiah  had  to  submit 
himself  to  the  Assyrian — a  submission  which  brought 
back  the  hard  feudatory  conditions  of  Judea,  and  lasted 
unaltered  during  all  the  rest  of  his  lifetime,  even  that 
of  his  son,  Manasseh.  "The  events  in  Mesopotamia,"  re- 
marks Hildebrandt  pointedly,  "soon  taught  the  prophet 
that  the  time  of  eternal  peace  for  the  nations  of  the 
earth  had  not  taken  its  so  warmly  hoped-for  beginning." 
The  lesson  was  indeed  a  dismal  one  for  the  prophet, 
the  king  and  the  people  alike.  Tor — so  we  are  in- 
formed by  the  relative  inscriptions  which  are  substan- 
tially upheld  by  the  most  competent  Assyriologists — 
Sennacherib  proceeded  with  ruthless  purpose  against 
Judah,  carried  by  storm  the  fortifications  of  the  rural 
towns,  and  led  captive  to  Assyria  many  thousands  of 
their  inhabitants.  A  number  at  least  of  those  towns 
were  cut  off  from  Hezekialf s  domain — the  bombastic 
cuneiform  inscriptions  give  out,  all — 'and  given  to  the 
Philistian  vassals  who  had  remained  faithful  to  their 
suzerain.*  Jerusalem  had  indeed  held  out  gallantly, 
and  her  brave  and  dauntless  defenders  had  successfully 
beaten  back  the  enemy's  fierce  onsets,  though  they  could 

*So  Winekler  and  Hildebrandt.  Stade  maintains,  however: 
"Yet  it  seems  tliat  be  (Hezekiali)  did  not  yield  to  the  giving 
over  of  Judean  territory  to  Philistian  cities,  nay  that  he  even 
enlarged  his  own  land  at  their  cost." 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      127 

not  prevent  the  battering  of  the  north  gate  of  the  city, 
and  the  breach  made  in  it.*  The  Judean  capital  was 
saved  with  its  king  and  its  people,  f  but  a  heavy  ransom 
had  to  be  paid  for  the  deliverance,  and  submission  to 
the  oppressive  Assyrian  vassalage  was  the  final  issue. 

The  prophet's  enthusiastic  forecasts  of  a  high  and 
glorious  Messianic  era  approaching,  given  forth  in  the 
cognate  passages  of  Isa.  11.  2-4,  IX.  1-6  and  XL  1-9, 


*Staae  says  that  the  legends  of  2  Kings  XVIII.,  XIX.,  err 
in  that  they  assume  that  Jerusalem  was  not  at  ail  assailed, 
and  the  officials  of  Sennacherib  had  come  to  the  gates  of  tlie 
city  only  for  delivering  his  messages.  Yet  'he  concedes  a 
partial  agreement,  in  other  respects,  of  'both  the  relative 
Hebrew  and  Assyrian  accounts.  The  very  conservative  theo- 
logian, Delitzsch,  (in  Herzog  and  Plitt's  Cyclopedia,  article 
Sennacherib)  says:  "What  'the  book  of  Kings  jointly  with  the 
book  of  Isaiia-h  says  concerning  these  occurrences,  is  without 
difficulty  reconcl'lable  with  the  cuneifo'iim  account."  Yet  he 
points  out,  on  the  one  side,  the  desiigned  concealment  in  this 
account  of  the  fatal  Issue  visited  upon  'the  division  of  Senna- 
cherib's army  which  had  besieged  Jerusalem,  and  also  a 
palpable  misrepresentation  in  regard  to  Hezekiah's  tribute; 
while  on  the  other  side  he  intimates  the  possibility  of  having 
to  place  an  iuterrogation  point  after  the  num'ber  185,000  of  the 
Biblical  narrtative  (2  Kings  XIX.  35;  Isa.  XXXVII.  36),  as  well 
as  'he  suggests  that  the  item  in  Sennacheriib's  cuneiform  ac- 
count of  his  deportation  of  200,150  Judeans  i'nto  captivity 
"seems  to  deserve  greater  attention  than  has  so  far  been  given 
to  it."  It  lies  beyond  onr  present  purpose  to  enter  at  any 
length  into  the  interesting  question  of  the  various  apparent 
divergences  and  possible  agreements  between  the  Biblical  and 
cuneiform  niarration^s  of  events  and  incidents  bearing  on  that 
most  important  portion  of  Israel's  tiistory. 

fStade  observes  that,  though  Juda'h  was  deprived  of  a  large 
part  of  population,  the  bulk  of  iher  martial  men  were  doul>tless 
concentrated  in  Jerusalem  and  were  thus  saved. 


128        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

were  soon  enough  confounded  and  frustrated  by  the 
most  gloomy  and  disastrous  realities.  The  turbulence 
and  convulsions  Judea  sustained  by  Sennacherib's  in- 
vasion were,  despite  the  rescue  of  Jerusalem,  a  dreadful 
offset  against  the  earlier  vision  of  the  dawn  of  a  bright 
and  golden  era  of  peace  being  at  hand.  To  see  the 
formerly  so  highly  exalted,  beloved  king  lowered  again 
from  tJic  high  pedestal  of  glorious  world-rule  upon 
which  Isaiah  had  set  him  in  his  transport  of  personal 
admiration  for  him  and  high  hope  for  the  nation,  must 
have  given  this  lofty  seer  a  most  humiliating  sensation. 
Like  a  dissolving  view  that  happy  vision  of  the  past  had 
now  vanished,  with  abashing  delusion  left  behind.  The 
labor  of  love  spent  on  the  dual  Messianic  message  of 
chpts.  IX.  1-6  and  XL  1-9,  proved  to  be  wasted  already 
after  a  short  interval,  with  the  re-subjection  of  the  crest- 
fallen Judean  king,  its  central  figure  and  glorified  hero. 
And,  however  exemplary  Hezekiah's  government  may 
have  been  in  regard  to  the  furtherance  of  pure  religion 
and  Hebrew  literature,  however  great  his  merits  in  every 
patriotic  respect,  yet  the  fancied  Messianic  glory  which 
Isaiah  >had  prefigured  for  his  reign  remained  utterly 
unfulfilled. 

Let  us  here  yet  quote  a  kindred  remark,  and  one,  as 
aforesaid,  made  by  a  recognized  scientific  authority.  It 
is  Stade,  the  learned  Avriter  of  the  'History  of  the  People 
of  Israel,'  who,  narrowing  his  similar  observations  to 
Isa.  II.  2-4,  expresses  the  following  sentiments:  "The 
prophet,  having  strongly  and  deeply  cherished  the 
fundamental  expectation  that  in  the  "after-days,"  in 
which  the  danger  from  Assyria  would  b©  taken  away, 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     129 

the  Messianic  empire  would  be  usliered  in,"'  understood 
practically  the  failure  of  the  Assyrian  attempts  upon 
Jerusalem  as  such  removal  of  danger.  Yet  in  this  he 
deceived  himself.  And  the  more  time  went  on  from 
that  decisive  year,  701  B.  C,  the  more  clearly  it  was 
shown  that  the  Messianic  empire  had  not  come.  In 
the  Judean  State  the  old  conditions  continued.  jSTay 
the  disaster  which  befell  the  Assyrians  in  that  year, 
signified  all  but  their  destruction  through  Jahve's  power,, 
which  Isaiah  had  predicted.  ...  It  is  true,  Jerusalem 
was  not  conquered,  yet  it  became  dependent  again  upon 
the  Assyrian  great-king,  who  continued  to  dominate  in 
Nineveh  as  the  lord  of  the  world."  "The  king  Ileze- 
kiah,"  says  Stade  in  another  part  of  his  history,  was 
indeed  "not  totally  vanquished,  he  was  only  reduced. 
Yet  he  had  to  own  homage  and  pay  tribute  again  to  the 
Assyrian  over-lord  as  before."  Things  had  fallen  out 
so  differently  from  the  glowing  imaginations  of  the 
prophets ! 

In  particular  had  Isaiah's  oracular  trilogy — if  we 

*A'bout  the  same  sentiment  Robertson  Smitli  (1.  c.  p.  300  sq.) 
expresses  In  regard  to  the  Messiianic  picture  of  Isa.  XI.  1-9. 
Suggesting  as  date  for  its  coimpositioin  about  B.  C.  720,  when 
the  Assyrian  had  accomplis'hed  the  fall  of  'Samaria  and  the 
destructio'n  of  the  .Syrian  principalities,  and  wihen  his  further 
movement  would  be  to  execute  judgment  as  Jehovah's  instru- 
iment  upon  Judah  as  well,  lie  lets  the  prophet  foreshow,  as 
ensuing  upon  that  divine  judgment,  days  of  blessing  under  '^a. 
new  sapling  that  springs  from  the  old  stock  of  Jesse"  (Isa. 
XI.  1).  The  "blessings  of  this  Messianic  time"  would  be  en- 
joyed, as  eoexteusive  with  the  fall  of  tlie  Assyrian,  by  the 
"remnant  of  Israel,"  (ibid.  X.  20)  which,  thus  delivered, 
would  henceforth  be  awarded  the  benefits  of  a  "reign  of  peace 
and  order,"  as  painted  an  Isa.  XI.  1-9. 
9 


130        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

may  call  so  tlie  at  least  spiritually  interconnected  pas- 
sages of  cli.  II.  2-4,  IX.  1-6  and  XI.  1-9— signally  failed 
of  accomplisliment.  The  brig'lit  hope  of  seeing  the 
Messianic  empire  inaugurated  with  Hezekiah,  the 
monarch  after  the  prophet's  heart,  who  was  from  the 
start  of  his  principate  so  full  of  promise  for  a  Davidic 
restoration,  was  now  woefully  betrayed.  Doubtless, 
it  had  at  the  time  found  a  living  echo  also  in  the  hearts 
of  the  rural  Judeans.  Yet  presently  they  were  crushed 
beneath  the  weight  of  (partial)  Assyrian  conquest. 
And  the  Jerusalemites — ^\vell,  they  had  gained  nothing 
but  the  transient  feeling  of  relief  from  the  perils  of  the 
siege.  At  best  there  was  mixed  with  it  a  proud  con- 
sciousness of  military  valor  which  proved  itself  so  suc- 
cessful in  the  unflinching  defence  of  the  citizens'  homes. 
But  for  all  that  they  had  no  real  victory  before  them. 
Reduced  again  as  they  were  to  feudal  relations  with  the 
Assyrian  suzerain,  they  must  have  felt  their  success  to  be 
but  a  phantom  achievement.  Practically,  it  was  a  worse 
defeat  than  "Sennacherib's  signal  overthrow*"  (so  Sayce, 

*Tliat  the  direct  aim  of  Sennaoherib's  campaign  of  B.  C. 
701  was  Anterior  Asia,  is  the  generally  accepted  notion  of 
those  modern  sicholars  who  follow  the  relative  cuneifo'rm 
documents.  Reuss  ('The  History  of  the  Holy  Writ  of  the  O. 
T.')  holds,  that  "the  huge  armies  whicih  Sargon  and  Senna- 
cherit)  led  into  the  field,  were  not  directed  against  impotent 
Judaih,"  but  against  Egypt.  This  is  also  the  positive  view  of 
Keil  (Conimentary,  on  1  Kings  XVIII.  13),  and  is  in  accord- 
anee  with  Herodotus  whom  he  cites  there.  Keil  endeavors  to 
support  Herodotus'  representation  by  2  Kings  XIX.  24  and  Isa. 
X.  24.  The  latter  passage  seems  indeed  rather  conclusive  in 
favor  of  this  position.  He  also  finds  further  evidence  for  it 
in  Tirhaka's  military  movemeujt  to  meet  Seinnacherilb's  army 
in  battle,  recounted  in  2  Kings  XIX.  9. 

Yet,  again,  there  is  in  onr  day  a  difference  of  view  on  this 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     131 

1.  c).  For  lie  could  soon  recover  again;  but  for  tlie  hap- 
less Judeans  there  had  been  newly  forged  the  chafing 
chains  of  hard  foreign  dependence.  If  they  should 
before  have  been  carried  along  by  the  prophet's  eloquent, 
poetic  promises,  their  spirits  were  again  subdued  and 
cowed,  as  though  those  bright  oracles  had  never  been 
spoken.  Their  charm  was  broken.  The  Judeans  were 
now  again  in  as  bad  a  way  and  as  far  off  from  the  ideal, 
Messianic  goal  as  they  were  before.  The  oracles,  con- 
sidering the  then  actual  situation,  were  valueless:     for, 

very  movemeat.  Winckler  (1.  e.)  diiscoiinects  him  entirely  with 
the  war  Oif  B.  C.  701.  He  a&suimes  another,  later  expedition  of 
Sennacherib  against  Palestine  and  Egypt,  wihioh  he  puts  at  B. 
O.  689-81.  He  contends  that  the  Tirhalia  of  S'cripture  belongs 
to  the  time  of  this  la;ter  Assyrian  expedition,  and  that  its  fatal 
issue — which  he  of  course  accounts  for  as  the  natural  affliction 
of  pestilence  befaMing  the  army— is  chronologically  to  be  in- 
terpreted accordingly. 

This  assumption  would,  we  remark,  be  in  good  stead  to  the 
©mailer  number  of  critics  who  reject  the  naiTatives  alike  of 
Herodotus,  II.  141,  and  Isaiah  XXXVII.  36  and  2  Kings  XIX. 
35,  even  if  stripped  of  the  miraculous  features,  as  in-econeil- 
able  wdth  the  cuneiform  accounts,  and  therefore  as  mythical. 
They  rest  their  position  upon  these  Assyrian  inscriptions  as  to 
the  decisive  battle  of  Altaku  (Eltekeh)  and  the  subsequent 
military  actions  of  Senuac'hei'ib.  According  to  Winckler's  new 
view,  the  latter' s  first  expedition  could  be  taken  as  truly  vic- 
torious and  unmarred  by  any  fatality.  The  sudden  departure 
of  Sennacherib  from  the  besieged  city  of  Jerusalem,  again, 
could  be  set  down  as  tiavrng  been  caused  'by  the  breaking  our 
of  new  d'istui''bances  in  Babylonia  (w'hietn  Winkler  reially 
suggests).  At  the  saime  time  the  Biblical  story  of  the  Assyrian 
fajtaliity  could,  in  the  main,  be  saved — an  endeiavor  whidh  even 
some  Assyriologists  have  not  disdained  to  miake.  In  conclu- 
sion we  refei'  the  student  to  Winer's  discussion,  in  BLbl.  ReaJl- 
worterbuch,  s.  v.  Hezekiah.  He  offers  there  a  rather  plausible 
solution  of  the  questions  involved  in  the  whole  subject. 


132        Tlie  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

having  once  failed,  tliey  must  have  failed  forever.  This 
is  an  indisputable  truism.  And  we  should,  too,  keep 
it  always  before  our  eyes  in  judging  of  the  true  merits 
of  those  and  similar  prophetic  utterances. 

Even  if  we  should  distinguish  with  Robertson  Smith 
(1.  c.)  between  "poetic  and  ideal  constructions,"  (such  as 
he  pronounces  Isaiah's  "concrete  pictures  of  the  future, 
in  which  he  embodied  his  faith  and  hope,  to  have  been 
from  the  necessity  of  the  case")  and  "literal  forecasts 
of  the  future,"  which  those  pictures  were  not  (as  he 
presumes),  we  would  obtain  no  better  results  of  adjust- 
ment of  the  question.  We  would  not  thereby  get  be- 
yond the  sober  fact  that  Isaiah's  predictions  of  the  Messi- 
anic empire  to  start  up  with  the  princely  "child"  (ch. 
IX.  6)  of  the  renowned  house  of  David,  had  at  and 
through  Sennacherib's  invasion  been  brought  to  naught. 
The  evasive  construction  put  upon  them  that  they  were 
nevertheless  Providentially  designed  to  be  realized  'in 
good  time,'  does  not  bear  the  touch  of  clear,  investigating 
thought.  If  Providence  refused  their  accomplishment 
all  through  the  good  time  of  the  good  king  Hezekiah, 
he  cannot  consistently  be  supposed  to  be  more  favorably 
inclined  to  any  other  time  for  the  consummation  of  that 
national  hope  of  Israel. 

At  this  point  we  are  recalled  to  Hildebrandt's  com- 
mentation of  Isa.  IX.  1-6.  We  followed  his  argument 
to  a  considerable  degree,  and  along  the  line  of  his 
apprehension  of  those  verses.  But  we  did  so  as  to  the 
sentiments  he  devolves  from  them  rather  than  the  his- 
toric-exegetical  construction  he  assumes  for  their  subject- 
matter.  Por  we  differ  essentially  from  him  both  as 
regards  the  principal  motive  of  this  his  construction,  the 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     133 

chronological  one,  and  tlie  manner  of  interpreting  the 
relative  text.  His  assumption  is — and  in  this  he  was 
guided  by  the  position  of  some  earlier  eminent  Assyrio- 
logists — that  Hezekiah's  reign  began  B.  C.  706-5,  about 
contemporaneously  with  Sennacherib's  accession,  which 
is  authoritatively  fixed  at  T05.  Pursuantly  he  conjec- 
tures that  Hezekiah's  revolt  against  Assyria  fell  at  a 
point  of  time  "when  he  had  not  long  been  on  the  throne," 
that  is,  within  705-1.  As  evidence  for  the  latter  hypo- 
thesis he  adduces  2  Kings  XVIII.  7,  to  which  he  adapts, 
as  supposably  yielding  the  same  chronological  sense,  Isa. 
IX.  3-6.  Xow,  we  have  to  object,  not  only  are  these 
passages  by  themselves  not  in  the  least  "decisive"  con- 
formably to  his  hypothesis,  there  stands  out  against  it 
the  more  v/eighty  point,  that  a  much  earlier  date  of 
Hezekiah's  accession  is  warranted  by  the  consensus  of  the 
best  modern  Assyriologists  and  theological  scholars* 

*The  ibeg'innmg  of  HezekiatL's  irergn  is  variously  d'ated  all 
the  way  from  728  to  ca.  705  B.  C.  The  imost  competent  modern 
scholars  determine  upon  a  ehronology  yiedding  a  long  enough 
space  of  time  for  a  well  setltle-d  istate  of  prosperity  in  the 
Jewish  land  under  itha,t  noted  monarch.  More  or  less  of  a 
quarter-century  of  happy  development  'and  splendid  prospect 
for  the  future  may  thus  be  gained.  All  this  seems  pei-fectly 
consonant,  too,  with  the  principal  facts  of  Hezekiah's  reign 
which  Hebrew  ti-adi'tion  hias  preseiwed,  aind  which  are  only 
intelligiiWe  if  a  solid  and  s^e'ttled  peaceable  progress  is  to  be 
presumed  as  haVing  markeid  out  the  earlier  part  of  his  reign. 
A  ibrief  .space  of  four  years  at  the  most,  Wihi'ch  would  result 
according  to  Hildelbrandt  land  those  few  others  who  incline  to 
synchronize  Sennacherib's  and  Hezekiah's  accessions,  could 
not  consistently  suffice  to  create  that  bright,  almost 
dazzling  sign  of  the  times  reflected  from  the  pages  of 
sacred  history  which  treat  of  the  events  of  Hezekiah's 
reign.    The    assumption,     then,     of    a    fairly     long    interval 


134         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

Ingeniously  enough,  it  is  true,  does  lie  expound  tlie 
passage  of  Isa.  IX,  1-6*.  Yet  contrary  chronological 
assurance,  and  lack  of  demonstrative  evidence -as  to  the 
textual  indication  of  2  Kings  XVIII.  7,  invalidate  his 
sagacious  exegetical  attempt. 

Xow  when  we  gain,  as  we  do  according  to  that  array 
of  more  recent  authority,  an  interval  between  Hezekiah's 
accession  and  his  later  revolt,  which  ranges  all  along 
from  B.  C.  728  to  705  or  thereabouts,  we  can  easily 

between  its  beginning  and  the  revolt  against  Assyria 
with  its  following  crisis,  is  well  justified,  and  we 
unqualifiedly  aidhei^e  to  it.  As  a  typical  Davldiic-Miessianic 
age  that  quarter-century  m'ight  accordingly  have  well  pasised 
in  the  exalte'd  vision  of  the  prophet  Isaiah  who,  as  we  hold, 
has  drawn  in  those  famous  passages  of  Chpts.  II.,  IX.  and  XL, 
brilliant  pictures  of  Wappinesis  and  glory  whiCh,  whilie  they 
os'tensiMy  fores'hadow  an  ideal  prospect  into  futurity,  were 
effectually  shadowing  forth  the  'bappy  aspect  of  the  present. 

Now  it  is  Delitzsch  wbo  fixes  the  date  of  Hezekiah's  acces- 
sion on  B.  C.  728.  Eeuss  assumes  727.  Wbile  this  date  is 
suggested  by  2  Kings  XVIII.  10,  yet  Stade  contends,  contrarily 
to  this  inference,  that  ibid.  ver.  13  must  be  upiheld  as  para- 
mount. He  idecides,  therefore,  on  B.  C.  715-714  as  the  daJte  to 
be  authentically  set  down  for  the  commencement  of  Heze- 
kiah's reign.  Wellhausen  and  Ruenen  concur  lin  this  chrono- 
logy. Cbeyne  indlines  to  B.  C.  724,  and  iSayce  about  the  same. 
The  latter' s  peculiar  conjectural  position,  that  the  ttex't  of  2 
Kings  XVIII.  13,  is  faulty  and  must  be  amended  into  the  indi- 
cation of  the  twenty-fourth  instead  of  the  fourteenlth  yeiar,  we 
have  elsewhere  brought  foi'ward.  Winckler  marks  B.  C.  720 
as  the  suitable  date. 

*Hi'ldebranidt  interprets  Isa.  IX.  5,  as  an  exultation  not 
over  the  real  inativity  (of  Hezekiah),  but  ihis  'royal'  birth, 
in  the  sense  of  formal  induction  into  kingship.  The  phraseo- 
logy, "For  a  child  is  born  unto  us,"  he  takes,  referring  to  Ps. 
II.  7,  as  being  a  trope  signifying  G-od's  solemn  iinstallation  of 
the  prince  as  Judean  king  upon  his  boly  mountain. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     135 

adjudge  likewise  about  the  same  extent  of  time  in 
which  Isaiah's  composition  of  ch.  IX.  1-6  can  have 
fallen.  Accordingly,  we  advance  the  following  two 
suppositions  for  the  approximate  date  of  this  passage. 

TWO  SUPPOSITIONS. 

Isaiah  may  have  written  it  at  ITezekiah's  birth  or 
accession.  In  the  former  view  we  hold  it  quite  possible 
that  he  composed  those  lines  to  lighten  his  heart  from  the 
heaviness  of  regret  and  dismay  over  the  idolatrous  enor- 
mities of  the  princely  child's  father,  Ahaz,  and  the  gen- 
eral state  of  in-eligion  which  then  prevailed,  as  well  as 
the  general  distress  into  which  this  monarch  had 
plunged  the  country;  see  especially  2  Chron.  XXIX. 
8,  9.  To  the  new-born  prince  he  attaches  his  fond  hope 
of  a  thorough  religious  and  moral  improvement,  as  well 
as  the  bright  vision  of  regenerated  power,  glory  and 
welfare,  which  characterized  traditionally  the  time  of 
David's  reign,  alleged  and  believed  to  have  been  exemp- 
lary in  all  those  respects.  At  the  same  time  he  magni- 
fied the  portraiture  of  his  princely  subject,  overdrawing 
it  upon  the  model  of  a  j^revious  prophecy. 

Let  us  bring  what  appears  to  us  a  very  striking  ana- 
logy of  prophetic  exaltation  of  a  great  person  connected 
with  his  birth.  It  is  from  Virgil's  Eclogues,  IV.  The 
poet  hails  the  birth  of  a  son  to  the  new  consul,  Pollio, 
who  had  after  a  Ions'  and  fierce  intestine  strife  and 
intense  misery  of  the  Roman  people  brought  about  the 
peace  of  Brundusium,  in  B.  C.  40.  He  recognizes  this 
nativity  as  a  propitious  omen  that  the  father's  consulate 
was  designed  to  usher  in  the  "great  year,"  w^itli  a  new 


136        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

and  better  physical  order  of  things.  By  this  great  year 
was  meant  the  imagined  re-birth  of  the  whole  universe 
according  to  the  Platonic  and  Stoic  mystical  notion  pre- 
valent in  Rome,  (ibid.  4,  5).  With  that  notion  of  a 
universal  character  there  was  combined  the  particular 
one  of  a  Roman  national  cycle,  according  to  which  there 
was  a  brilliant  prospect  of  the  golden,  Saturnian  age 
returning,  the  wretched  iron  age  being  then  believed,  as 
it  Avould  appear  from  ibid.  6-10,  to  be  drawing  to  its 
close.  Virgil  holds  out  the  assurance  that  the  new-bom 
son  will  once  rule  in  his  father's  place,  and  adorned  with 
his  father's  virtues,  over  a  peaceful  Roman  world  (ibid. 
17).  The  earth  will  offer  to  him — as  a  sign  of  the 
advent  of  the  golden  age — various  spontaneously  grown 
products;  goats  will  give  freely  their  milk,  and  they  will 
no  more,  either,  fear  the  big  lions;  serpents  and  poison- 
ous plants  will  have  been  entirely  taken  away  from  the 
earth.  When  advancing  in  ^^ears  the  boy  will  witness 
around  him  a  rich  fertility  of  the  soil  and  an  abundant, 
even  miraculous,  production  from  it.  In  his  manhood 
the  earth  will  bring  forth  everything  spontaneously,  and' 
there  will  be  no  more  need  of  agricultural  toil,  etc. 

This  blessed  and  splendid  era  the  poet  is  confident 
was  decreed  by  Fate  and  already  coming  on  apace,  judg- 
ing, as  he  observes,  by  a  certain  mysterious  vibration  of 
the  universe  which  he  claims  to  feel,  as  being  indicative 
of  "all  things  rejoicing  over  the  arrival  of  the  (golden) 
age"  (ib.  52). 

In  connection  with  this  allegation  from  Virgil  we 
mention  that  it  has  been  frequently  suggested  that  the 
Isaianic  passage  in  Question  may  have  crept  into  some 
books   of  the   manifold   Sibylline  literature,   and   that 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      137 

Virgil  may  have  partially  adopted  the  motive  and  color- 
ing of  that  charming  fiction  from  this  widely  recognized 
prophetic  source.  This  is  indeed  all  the  more  possible 
as  he  directly  refers  in  that  very  eclogue  to  the  Cumean 
Sibyl,  then  the  most  renowned.  We  cannot  discuss  our 
point  at  greater  length.  Enough  to  have  shown  a  very 
suggestive  analogy  from  anotlier  literature  of  affixing 
glowing  promises  to  a  new-born  child  from  the  higher 
rank  of  society.  By  it  the  supposition  will  admittedly 
gain  stronger  ground,  that  the  prophetic  lines  discussed 
may  have  originated  at  the  early  date  of  Hezekiah's 
birth. 

Still  another  proposition  as  to  the  probable  date 
of  that  prophetic  utterance  of  Isaiah  we  will  bring  for- 
ward. It  is  much  more  to  our  mind  and  inclines  us  to 
urge  it  as  deserving  definite  acceptance.  It  is,  that  we 
may  safely  refer  the  composition  to  a  point  of  time  soon 
after  Ahaz'  death  and  his  son,  Hezekiah's,  succession. 
It  may  upon  this  premise  well  fit  into  the  occasion  of  this 
young  king's  ardent  and  zealous  stir  anH  effort  to  cleanse 
away  the  base  disorder  and  pollutions  which  his  un- 
worthy father  had  indulged  and  made  common  by  his 
depraved  example,  and  to  restore  the  national  religion 
again  in  its  purity.  This  was  to  the  prophet  an  assur- 
ance that  better  days  were  at  hand  for  Judah.  God, 
his  thought  was,  would  under  such  improved  religious 
conditions  of  the  nation  take  pity  and  remove  the  dark- 
ness of  Assyrian  oppression  from  the  land  (see  ibid. 
IX.  1)  and  cause  by  it  great  rejoicing  to  his  people  (v. 
2);  he  would  interfere  for  them  with  his  miraculous 
power  and  "break  their  yoke" — that  forced  on  them  by 
the  Assyrians— (v.  3),  even  annihilate  the  martial  accou- 


138         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

terments  of  this  tyrannical  power.  These  "later  day" 
blessings  would  be  Providentially  dispensed  under  the 
new  regimen  of  the  God-endowed  and  God-beloved 
Messianic  sovereign  Hezekiah  {\y.  5,  6). 

ISTow  if  the  last  supposition  be  upheld,  we  may  safely 
assume  that  the  prophetic  passage  in  point  belongs  to  the 
earliest  or  at  least  early  days  of  Hezekiah's  reign.  Yet 
another  seeming  difficulty  may  be  raised  against  it  in 
view  of  the  phraseology,  "For  unto  us  a  child  is  born, 
etc."  Would  such  language,  it  may  be  asked,  fit  the 
Judean  king  who,  thougii  he  was  then  yet  in  his  youth 
or  early  prime  of  manhood,  could  not  sensibly  be  called 
a  (newly)  born  child  any  more?  To  resolve  this  difii- 
culty  we  advocate  the  following  apprehension.  The 
prophet  may  have  wished  to  present  in  a  most  solemn 
style  and  with  oracular  impressiveness  the  idea,  that 
Jehovah's  design  of  saving  Israel  and  prospering  them 
again  had  already  been  spermatically  enveloped  in  the 
life  ^of  the  new  king  when  yet  an  infant,  or,  in  other 
words,  been  long  ago  predestined  in  the  Divine  counsel. 
(As  to  the  grammatical  merits  of  the  verb  used  in  the 
noted  clause,  which  come  in  essentially  in  the  case, 
we  have  to  refer  to  the  subjoined  note.)* 

A  suitable  analogy  of  such  literary  form  of  ex- 
pression can  be  adduced  from  the  same  above-quoted 
Latin  poet,  Virgil,  in  Aeneid  I.  286-296.  Virgil  intro- 
duces there  Jupiter  as  disclosing  to  his  daughter, 
Venus,     the     far-off     future     of     the     Trojan-Roman 

*Gesenius,  Commentary,  in  loco,  p.  361-363,  wavers  between 
tlie  futuric  and  preterite  apprehension  of  the  verb  ynllad  "is 
born."  Yet  he  owns,  nevertheless,  that  there  can  be  no  ques- 
tion that  the  prophet  attached  his  fond  and  strong  hope 
to  Hezeliiah,  when  yet  a  lad,  as  the  ideal  liing  coming. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     139 

race,  tlie  pitli  of  whicli  oracle  is  the  celebra- 
tion of  the  birth  of  Caesar  (Augustus)  and  the 
glory  and  bliss  of  his  reign.  With  the  nativity 
of  this  Caesar  AVhose  "empire  will  be  bounded  only  by 
the  Ocean  and  whose  fame  will  reach  to  the  stars,"  the 
hard  ages  will  grow  mild,  as  wars  will  then  have  come  to 
an  end  and  be  abolished.  The  ancient  "faith"  (also  in 
the  sense  of  truth  and  honor),  domestic  virtues  and  har- 
monious wise  government  will  prevail  (again).  The 
dread  gates  of  war  (the  gates  of  the  temple  of  Janus, 
whic^h  were  since  I^uma  customarily  open  in  time  of  war) 
will  be  finnly  and  tightly  closed,  and  "within  (the 
temple)  the  wicked  fury  (of  war),  sitting  upon  the  fierce 
arms  and  bound  fast  with  brazen  chains,  will  rage  fright- 
fully with  its  bloody  jaw^s." 

ISTow  it  seems  quite  reasonable  to  suppose  that  Virgil 
gave  forth  those  panegyric  lines  when  his  high  patron^ 
the  emperor  Augustus,  had  really  given  good,  solid 
promise  of  a  peaceful  reign.  Indeed  were  the  war  gates 
closed  at  his  order  twice  during  his  reign,  in  B.  C.  29 
and  25.*  Such  auspicious  condition  had  not  happened 
for  over  two  centuries  previous.  The  Roman  world 
seemed  placated  in  either  one  of  those  two  years,  and 
Virgil  may  at  one  of  these  particular  points  of  time  have 
written  and  dedicated  that  alleged  oracle  to  his  adored 
imperial  patron.  He  may  himself  have  had  and  nursed 
the  illusion  bodied  forth  in  the  oracle.  The  Julian  one- 
man  rule  may  really  have  inspired  his  imagination  with 
the  fascinating  perspective  that  an  era  of  peace  was  ahead 
of  the  Roman  nation.  Weary  with  the  past  civil  strug- 
gles and  the  mutual  contests  of  the  political  leaders  of 
Rome,  ho  with  all  the  better  people  of  his  nation  no 


140        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

doubt  longed  anxiously  for  tlie  golden  era  of  peace  and 
prosperity  which  legend  had  always  held  in  store  for 
some  future  times.  Yirgil  may  have  fancied  to  see  it 
dawn,  even  break  soon  after  the  accession  of  the  new 
Caesar.  Or,  it  may  be,  he  intended  by  that  graceful 
imagery  merely  to  flatter  his  sovereign  in  his  dis- 
tingiiished  ofiice  of  court-poet. 

May  Ave  not  consistently  infer  that  a  similar  origin 
can  be  ascribed  to  Isaiah's  rapturous  lines  of  ch.  IX. 
1-6,  and  also  to  those  so  closely  related  to  them,  ch.  XI. 
1-9?  They  resemble  Virgil's  pretended  oracle  so  very 
much.  Both  are  alike  in  the  prediction  of  unbounded 
dominion  and  endless  peace — the  happy  state  of  the 
ideal  era  to  come.  (This  the  Romans  connected  with 
the  mythical  Saturnian  age  of  the  dim  past,  and  believed 
in  as  re-prospective  in  the  historical  period  of  the 
Empire.  The  prophets  of  Israel  referred  it,  now 
expressly  and  now  tacitly,  to  the  Jehovah-disposed 
indefinite  "latter"  or  "later  days.") 

The  time  and  occasion  for  the  composition  of  Isaiah's 
noted  verses  suggest  themselves  as  having  been  the 
earliest  or  at  least  the  earlier  part  of  Hezekiah's  reign, 
when  this  monarch  was  putting  forth  such  commenda- 
ble zeal  for  pure  religion.*     It  can  at  that  particular 

*!Modern  criticism  has  ibrought  forward  some  very  grave 
adverse  opinions  on  tlie  traditional  p'iety  of  king  Hezekiah. 
As  disputing  the  sipontaneity  of  liis  pious  zeal,  we  mention 
Stade  and  Winekler.  The  formei"  (in  his  'History,  etc.')  avers 
that  his  1-emarka.ble  religious  refoi'mation  can  "scarcely  be  set 
down  as  referrible  to  the  beginning  of  Hezekiah's  reign,  but 
explains  itself  naturally  as  a  result  of  the  sudden  deliverance 
from  Sennac'herib's  onset,  under  the  invasion  of  B.  C.  701." 
Stade  contends  that  until  this  fortunate  occurrence,  idolatry 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.      141 

time  not  liave  been  very  miicli  to  set  tlie  prophet's 
heart  aglow  with  ardent  admiration  for  his  king,  and 
inspire  him  to  make  a  vivid  portrait  of  the  ideal  State 
administered  by  an  ideal  ruler,  in  a  word,  a  Messianic 
portrait.  The  essential  motive  for  it  was  none  other 
than  to  celebrate  the  reigning  king,  Hezekiah.  For 
the  idea  once  justified  in  his  mind  and  conscience  of 
apprehending  and  setting  out  this  highly  merited,  pious 
monarch  as  the  representative  of  such  idealistic  premise, 
it  could  not  have  been  long  in  being  seized  upon  by  his 
poetic  muse  as  well.  The  muse  impelled  him,  indeed, 
to  delineate  the  superb  traits  of  his  beloved  royal  friend 
as  those  of  a  real  Messiah.  But  he  practically  did  so 
only  by  the  way  of  suggestion,  presenting  the  happy  and 
glorious  state  with  its  all-excelling  ruler  as  to  he.     The 

existed  among  the  Judeans.  He  even  charges  that  Hezekiah 
counteuaiuced  the  abominaible  institution  of  Topheth,  inaugur- 
ated by  his  father,  Ahaz.  This  he  would  infer  from  Isa.  XXX. 
33.  The  king's  puritan  religiousness  and  practical  efforts  at 
a  thorough  reform  of  worship  he  puts  as  late  as  that  happy 
deliverance,  which  must  bave  wi'ought  a  radical  change  in  his 
mind  and  sentiment.  About  the  same  view  is  held  by 
Winekler  (1.  c). 

iSayce,  too,  determines  upon  a  late  date  of  Hezekiah's  refor- 
mation, yet  construes  it  m-uch  more  creditably  to  him.  "When 
Sennacherib  threatened  Jerusalem,"  he  says  in  'The  Times  of 
Isiaiah,'  "the  reformis  of  Hezekiah  were  but  just  accomplished, 
etc."  Now  the  position  of  the  two  first-mamed  critics  we 
must  pronounce  as  uttei'ly  inadmissible.  Even  Sayce's  view 
appears  untenable  in  the  face  of  this  unquestioned  fact,  which 
refutes  on  the  whole  all  antagonistic  judgments  on  the  pious 
temper  of  the  Ju'dean  king,  Hezekiah.  We  refer  to  the  invita- 
tion which  the  latter  sent  to  the  people  of  the  Ephraimite 
kingdom  to  take  active  part  in  the  Jenisalemite  Passover 
celebration  (see  2  Ohr.  XXX.  1-11).  The  genuineness  of  this 
account  cannot  be  disputed.    It  leaves  no  doubt,  either,  that 


142        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Pro'phetic 

real  personage  to  be  rendered  in  tlie  picture  retreated 
into  the  back-ground  under  the  careful  touch  of  his 
graphic  pen.  For  his  purpose  was  obviously  to  with- 
hold the  subject  of  his  poetic  exaltation  from  the  distinct 
ken  of  the  public,  though  in  his  own  vision  this  subject 
stood  out  in  a  most  vital  and  solid  shape. 

His  heart  was  closely  wrapt  up  in  that  of  his  great 
royal  friend.  He  had  likely  been  Hezekiah's  mentor 
and  tutor  in  his  childhood  and  earlier  youth,  and  was 
possibly  at  the  time  of  composing  the  glorifying  lines, 
Judean  court-prophet  (compare  on  this  Kuenen,  1.  c.  p. 
29),  a  court-prophet,  though,  who  would  not  "cringe 
around  the  throne,"  but  aim  sincerely  and  strenuously 
to  support  it  with  his  best  religious  and  political  counsel. 
The  current  "far  off"  notion,  fondly  cherished  also  by 
himself,  of  a  coming  era  of  happiness  under  the  "prince 

it  happened  toefore  the  fall  of  Samaria  (B.  C.  722-720).  The 
partial  transjordanie  deportation  of  Israelites  of  that  kingdom 
under  Tiglath-Pileser  (see  2  Kings  XV.  29)  bad  indeed,  accord- 
ing to  an  express  reference  to  it  in  that  passage  of  Ohr.  (vv. 
6-10),  been  a  matter  of  the  past  at  the  time  of  that  invitation. 
Yet  the  fatal  issue  of  Samaria's  fall  was  yet  unaccomplished: 
see  ibid.  v.  6.  Is  this  not  a  conclusive  and  convincing  proof 
that  Hezekiah's  reform  movement  fell  in  the  beginining  of  his 
reign,  and  most  likely  in  its  year,  just  as  the  writer  of 
Chronicles  reports? 

We  consider  it  too  curioius  that  such  eminent  scholars  as 
Stade,  Winckler  and  Sayce  should  have  overlooked  or  pur- 
posely ignored  the  patent  evidence  we  just  p'roduced,  an 
evidence  com;pletely  vindicating  the  Biblical  traditions  of 
Hezekiah's  true  and  active  piety.  It  proves  indisputably  that 
he  had  set  forth  for  the  holy  task  of  religious  reformation  from 
his  own  mind  and  a  spontaneous  motive;  also  that  the 
reformation  itself  is  to  be  referred  to  the  earliest  period  of  his 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     1^3 

of  peace,"  witli  liis  boundless  miglit  and  majesty,  was 
bodied  forth  accordingly  in  the  verses  of  cli.  IX.  1-6,  tbe 
identification  of  Ilezekiali  Avitb  it  having  been  all  but 
expressly  personal.  This  era  the  prophet  held  doubtless 
near  enough  at  hard  to  feel  it  in  his  warm  imag-ination 
as  already  present:  it  was  at  all  events  to  be  gradually 
accomplished  yet  under  Hezekiah's  principate. 

The  figures  used  both  in  those  verses  and  in  ch.  XI. 
1-9,  answered  no  doubt  to  his  surpassing  appreciation 
of  the  beloved  prince's  worth  and  Messianic  qualification. 
These  he  could  all  the  more  magnify  as  he  fixed  in  his 
prophecy  upon  the  vague  mode  of  intimation.  Intima- 
tion allows  in  all  instances,  of  good  and  evil  alike,  an 
almost  unlimited  scope  of  exaggeration.  As  well  as 
cowardly  malice  may  intrench  itseK  safely  behind  the 
guard  of  impersonality  and  then,  with  impunity,  give 
vent  to  bitter  abuse  or  sharp  invective,  so  may  an  exalta- 
tion to  extreme  proportions  screen  itself  from  the  charge 
of  personal  fawning,  so  apt  to  be  made  by  discerning 
outsiders,  under  the  cloak  of  indirect  address :  the  differ- 
ence being,  of  course,  that  in  the  latter  case  the  end  in 
view  is  a  ready  discovery  by  the  subject  of  the  flattery, 
while  in  the  former  a  total  secrecy  as  to  the  subject  of 
the  scorn  is  the  only  safeguard. 

ISTow  the  intimation  Isaiah  chose  Ave  hold  to  have 
been  akin  to  that  employed  by  Virgil.  It  consisted  in 
introducing  an  oracle  pretended  to  have  been  vouchsafed 
in  the  past.  In  both  writers  the  intermingling  of  three 
tenses,  the  past,  present  and  future,  by  a  mysterious 
bound  from  an  imaginary  past  to  the  application  in  the 
present,  which  was,  again,  future  f.t  the  time  of  the 
alleged  original  revelation,  characterizes  the  poetic  utter- 


14:4:        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

auces.  Those  three  tenses  blend  in  Isaiah  in  the  verb  of 
the  clause,  "For  nnto  ns  a  child  is  born"  (ch.  IX.  6), 
This  expression  in  the  uncertain  Hebrew  tense  of  its 
verb,  oscillating,  as  it  may  be  considered  to  be,  between 
the  future  and  past  (see  previous  note  page  138) 
receives  under  our  proposed  construction  even  a  triple 
character  as  to  tenses  employed  and  understood.  By 
the  turn  the  prophet,  as  we  take  it,  gave  to  the  alleged 
revelation  of  the  past  in  literarily  divulging  it  for  the 
first  time  so  late  as  the  period  of  Hezekiah's  actual  reign, 
Adz.,  "For  unto  us  a  child  will  be  born,"  there  is  created  a 
threefold  sense  and  tense,  past,  present  ahd  future.* 

*We  remark  that  alike  the  futuric  sense  of  the  entire  dis- 
course oif  ch.  IX,  1-6,  anrl  its  allusion  to  Hezekiah,  (become  the 
more  apparent  and  well-nigh  assured,  as  we  turn  our  attentioin 
to  the  analogue  lof  Isa.  XIV.  29.  The  illustration  this  passage 
yields  we  considei'  as  oif  inestim'aMe  exegebieal  value.  Its 
purport  is  a  pT'ophetic  address  to  the  Philistines,  (bearing  the 
express  date  of  the  year  of  Ahaz'  death:  "Rejoice  not  thou, 
whole  Palestina,  because  the  rod  of  Mm  that  smoite  ithee  is 
broken  (referring  to  the  incursions  for  conquest  under  king 
Ahaz  and  the  temporary  independence  from  Judah  thus 
gained;  'see  2  Ohr.  XXVIII.  18):  for  out  of  the  seiipent's  root 
shall  come  foiffch  a  cockatrice,  and  ihis  fruit  shall  ibe  a  fiery 
flying  serpent."  That  no  other  (but  Ahaz'  son  and  successor, 
Hezekiah,  is  here  meant,  admits  of  no  question.  The  image 
under  Which  he  is  represented  is,  that  he  came  from  a  "root." 
This  is  a  phraseology  similar  to  that  of  ch.  XI.  1.  The  verb 
yetse  "shall  come  forth"  is  in  the  future  tense  proper,  whereas 
the  sprout-^Hezekiah—  was  already  on  the  active  scene  of  life 
and  government,  i^eady  at  any  moment,  as  the  propheit  held 
doubtless  before  his  mind,  to  effect  a  deadly  sting.  iHe  did 
effect  it,  too,  as  we  learn  from  2  Kings  XVIII.  8.  The  futuric 
expression  has  here  evidenitly  the  meaning  of  the  present, 
with  the  turn  of  an  immedi^ately  impending  occurrence. 

The  same  constiniction  is,  we  hold,  to  l>e  put  on  the  term 
weyatsa  "shall  come  forth,"  in  eh.  XI.  1.    It  is  grammatically 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     145 

All  tills  was,  we  simiiise,  resorted  to  that  it  might  sub- 
serve Ills  single  and  lofty  purpose  of  representing  Heze- 
kiali  as  the  personificator  of  the  Messianic  idea  as  he  con- 
ceived it. 

Let  us  say  that  in  all  probability  the  outward  condi- 
tions in  the  earlier  period  of  Hezekiah's  reign  corres- 
ponded to  the  glorious  Messianic  estimate  of  it  held  by 
the  prophet.  Prosperity  signalized  his  reign  from 
his  accession  to  his  ill-advised  unfortunate  revolt 
against  Assyria  iinder  Sennacherib.  This  inter- 
val, perhaps  in  its  entire  length,  was  well  adapted  for 
Isaiah's  idealistic  descriptions  in  the  dual  formula  of  ch. 
IX.  and  XI.  Stade,  in  his  'History  of  the  People  of 
Israel,'  repudiating  the  Assyriologist  assumption  of  any 
anti-Assyrian  attempt  having  been  made  by  Hezekiah 

converted  into  (bearing  a  future  sense,  which  wooild  even, 
judg-ing  hy  i'ts  direct  consecution  upon  eh.  X.  34,  he  com- 
manded ifrom  this  internal  evidence  (see  Gesenius,  in  loco). 
The  "coming  fourth"  is,  then,  oscillating  between  the  present 
and  the  future.  But,  on  the  other  'hand,  it  has  to  be  borne  in 
mind,  that  in  neither  passiage  the  sprout  was  actually  one  to 
be  generated.  It  existed  already.  The  futurie  form  is  in 
both  instances  chosen  merely  to  indicate  a  relative  impend- 
ing action.  Now  this  'sprout,'  w'hether  under  the  one  figure  of 
ch.  XIV.  29,  or  the  other  of  cih.  XI.  1,  is  to  be  uudersltood  as  no 
other  than  Hezekiah.  He  was,  is,  and  will  be,  respectively, 
what  the  propheit  designed  'him  to  be.  And  it  is  for  this  reason 
that  the  tenses  must  in  such  discourse  riot  be  pressed  too 
closely. 

An  additional  support  to  our  assumption  that  in  both, 
places  king  Hezekiah  is  alluded  to,  we  find  in  this  circum- 
stance. In  the  contexts  of  both  passages  the  assurance  is 
given  to  the  "jwor,"  those  wretched  ones  of  is'ociety,  figuring 
in  Scripture  so  often  as  violently  treated  and  trodden  down  by 
the  powei'ful  wealthy,  that  under  the  forthcoming  sprout  (as 
ruler)  they  would  meet  with  fair  eoniS'ideration  and  dealing. 

10 


146        The  Chrisiwus  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

till  that  later  revolt,  suggests  that  not  only  was  Judea  in 
all  that  interval  free  from  grave  disturbances,  it  even 
enjoyed  a  marked  degree  of  happy  development  and  ex- 
pansion— a  state  which  conld  easily  be  taken  as  symp- 
tomatic of  the  Messianic  bliss  traditionally  expected  for 
the  future.  Sagaciously  Stade  derives  from  Isa.  II.  Y, 
that  in  those  years  of  domestic  tranquillity  and  welfare, 
Hezekiah  could  even  think  of  increasing  his  military 
power. 

But  whether  or  no  this  supposition  is  really  to  be 
traced  in  the  quoted  passage,  this  much  seems  very 
probable,  that  prosperity  characterized  the  Judean  affairs 
during  all  the  interval  between  Hezekiah's  accession  and 
the  turbulence  and  catastrophe  of  the  Assyrian  inva- 
sion.* 

To  this  whole  intervening  time  a  composition  like 
that  of  the  remarkable  passages  of  Isa.  IX.  and  XI., 
can  fairly  be  held  suitable,  if  we  view  them  in  the  light 
of  an  exaggerated  reflection  of  the  happy  aspect  of  the 
times — an  apprehension  we  think  so  very  justifiable. 

According  to  Stade,  fourteen  years  intervened  from 
the  beginning  of  Hezekiah's  reign  to  Sennacherib's 
invading  campaign,  in  701  B.  C.  Other  \mters  bring 
his  accession,  as  already  noted  before,  much  farther  up. 
This  would  give  us  a  still  ampler  time,  to  the  whole  range 
of  which  that  dual  composition  may  reasonably  be 
referred. 

*That  the  "early  years"  of  Hezekiah's  reign  "appear  to 
have  been  very  prosperous,"  is  also  Rawlinson's  view,  in  'The 
Kings  of  Issrael  and  Juda'h.'  He  refers  for  it,  among  other 
p'assages,  to  these  more  wedghty  ones:  2  Kings  XVIII.  7;  XX. 
12-15;  2  Ohron.  XXXII.  27-30;  XXXI.  5  sq. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     147 

That  Hezekiah  was  once   during  this  interval  in- 
volved  in    a   warfare    with   the   Philistines    (2    Kings 
XVIII.  8),  cannot  be  regarded  as  standing  out  validly 
against  the  assumption  that  prosperity  then  dominated 
in  the  Judean  land.     For  this  contest  may  have  been 
only  of  a  short  duration,  or  it  was  possibly,  as  Winckler 
(1.  c.  p.  220)  maintains,  not  even  waged  with  all  Philis- 
tine   principalities.      Again,    such    adversaries    as    the 
Palestinian  nationalities,  were,  m  the  prophet's  eyes  at 
least,  not  big  and  dangerous  enough  to  cause  any  serious 
alarm  to  the  Judean  nation  (compare  Isa.  XI.  14,  and 
see  above  p.  55).     They  were  to  him,  according  to  the 
expressions  of   the   latter  verse,   no  match   at   all   for 
Israel,  especially  if  it  should  fall  to  the  task  of  the  all- 
powerful  Messiah  to  deal  with  them,  and  more  especially 
in  the  view,  that  Jehovah  would  always  be  disposed  to 
render  aid  to  his  people  against  those  neighboring  foes, 
if  they  should  prove  worthy  of  it — a  view  so  strongly 
held  and  repeatedly  affirmed  by  Isaiah.     Furthermore, 
as  Hezekiah  is  reported  to  have  been  successful  in  that 
campaign,  ha\ang  ''smitten"  the  Philistines,  this  warlike 
incident  could  not  consistently  appear  to  Isaiah  as  a 
real  interruption  of  the  even  run  of  domestic  welfare 
under  Hezekiah. 

Of  much  more  consequence  were,  indeed,  the  gTind- 
ing  tributary  relations  to  Assyria,  which  were  certainly  a 
most  dispiriting  offset  against  the  peaceful  and  happy 
aspect  which  Judah  had  otherwise  offered  in  those  days. 
To  be  sure,  while  smarting  under  this  hard  yoke  of 
tributary  dependence,  peace  and  welfare  were  not  com- 
plete, however  flourishing,  in  all  other  respects,  the 
domestic   institutions  of  Judah  mav  then  have  been. 


148         The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

This  dependence  was  trying  and  vexatious  enougt.  to 
depress  tlie  spirits  of  even  tlie  strongest  optimists  among 
the  Judeans.  Yet  Isaiali  excelled  in  regard  to  this 
most  troublesome  and  cheerless  jDolitical  condition  of  the 
country.  It  could  not  irritate,  warm  and  noble  patriot 
though  he  was,  his  balance  of  mind.  He  remained  calm 
and  untroubled,  and  wished  and  urged  his  people  to  be 
so,  too,  in  the  firm  reliance  in  God's  ever  ready  assist- 
ance. It  did  in  no  manner  disturb  his  buoyant  outlook 
for  a  bright  future.  For  is  not  everything  possible  to 
Jehovah,  the  Almighty?  He  can  and  will — this  is  our 
interpretation  of  ver.  3  in  Isa.  IX.  (see  above  p.  137) — 
break  that  hard  and  degrading  yoke,  which  pressed  so 
heavily  upon  his  people,  and  was  so  ominously  and 
obstructively  in  the  way  of  their  true  welfare  and 
the  pros"nective  verification  of  the  inherited  and  Script- 
urally  inherent  promise  of  Messianic  bliss  and  power.* 

*TMs  jnterpreitiatron  is  perfectly  admiisslible  from  a  Hebrew 
gi'amimatical  point  of  view.  For  it  is  notoriouis  that  in  the 
proplietieal  diction  the  past  tense  may  have  as  well  a  future,as 
it  ordinarily  ihas  a  past  and  a  present  meaning  inter- 
changeably. This  is  borne  out  by  internal  evidences. 
See  Gesenius,  'Lehrgeibilude'  p.  764.  In  the  present  instance 
it  is  yet  particularly  confirmed  by  the  following  note- 
wortliy  circumistanee.  We  refer  to  Isia.  X.  27.  This  passage 
is  a  most  significant  and  at  the  same  time  illustrative  coun- 
terpart of  ver.  3  in  question.  iContentS'  and  bearing  are  in  both 
places  sub'Stanti'ally  the  sam#.  Yet  in  the  former  the  prophet 
employs  the  real  future  tense.  Is  this  mot  conclusive  enough 
that  the  verb  in  eh.  IX.  3,  too,  was  meant  in  the  future  sense? 
As  to  the  identity  oif  imeaning  in  both  passages,  it  is  clear 
beyond  any  dispute.  In  eiither  passage  the  idea  is  given  forth 
that  it  'is  anxiously  expected,  that  Jehovah  ^"^1  deal  effedtually 
with  the  'Cruelly  oppressive  Assyrian  king,  and  in  a  supernat- 
urally  eatastropbic  way.    The  latter  is  shown  by  the  reference 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     149 

And  he  will,  too,  accomplish  it — under  snch  a  pious 
ruler  as  king  Hezekiah. 

Probably,  too,  the  prophet  assigned  in  his  mental 
vision  the  partial  execution  of  this  Providential  catastro- 
phe to  the  Messianic  king — his  own  Messianic  king, 
Hezekiah.  A  close  co-operation  of  the  Messiah  in  the 
Divine  procedure  is  always  presupposed  in  the  prophets. 

ISTow  this  consummation,  doubtless  the  very  crown 
of  Israel's  fond  longing  for  the  great  Messianic  future, 
we  hold  to  be  obscurely  indicated  in  ch.  IX.  1-6,  and 
that,  too,  as  we  construe  it  by  the  way  of  analogy  to  the 
Aeneid  (1.  c),  under  the  allegation  that  the  event  had 

in  botli  chiaptei-s  to  .Tehovah's  ajstounfliing  in'tereession  for  liis 
people  aigaiinistt  the  M'idiiiariite®  of  old  (see  Judges  VII.)  By 
this  referenoe  'the  prophet  seeks  to  sxipport  his  hope  that  Grod 
would  now  once  more  voiuohsafe  a  sudden,  miiiaeulous  inter- 
ference for  his  people,  to  deliver  them  fr'om  their  present 
tyrannical  over-lord,  the  Assyrian.  Fire — Jehovah's  own  pecu- 
liar essence — is  this  time  held  in  view  in  the  prophet's  imagina- 
tion for  the  destruction  of  the  ruthless  oppressoi'. 

We  are  ye't  to  remarli  that  our  above-presented  'aji>prehen- 
sion  of  ch.  IX.  3,  can  not  only  be  made  out  in  a  gi'ammati<?al 
respect,  it  is  even  provably  co'nformable  to  Isaliah's  religious 
principle  and  mode  of  reflection.  This  was,  the  avoidance  of 
all  imprudent  and  ifash  attempts  at  human  self-help,  when  it 
has  to  set  itself  against  a  supei'ior  worldly  power,  as  was  the 
case  in  the  relation  iof  Judah  with  the  AssijT.'ian  over-lord. 
In  all  such  plights  a  passive  attitude,  with  a  pious  waiting 
upon  Jehovah's  assistance  and  relief  was  the  only  wise  and 
right  proceeding.  See  especially  Isa.  XXX.  15.  The  theory  is 
that  of  non-resistance — only  with  a  sti'ong  and  intense  relig'i- 
ous  base. 

Accordingly,  we  deem  it  proper  to  add  in  this  place,  that 
to  speak  of  Isaiah's  "soldier-spirit,"  as  Hackmann  (quoted  by 
Clieyne,  'Inbrod.,  etc.')  does,  is  a  dowm'ight  misrepresentation 
of  the  prophet's  true  character. 


150        Tlie  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

been  predestined  by  the  Deity  already  when  the  "child 
was  born"  (or  even  earlier) — this  having  now  for  the 
first  time  been  prophetically  disclosed.  That  Isiaiah 
quite  confidently  looked  forward  to  such  consummation 
we  have  no  doubt.  He  would,  consistently  with  his  pro- 
found piety  and  trust  in  God,  base  such  expectation  on 
the  king's  own  pious  devotion,  so  exemplarily  manifested 
in  the  restoration  of  the  pure  worship  of  Jehovah. 

The  beatific  Adsion  of  the  prophet  was  not  realized. 
While  he  was  "dreaming  the  dream  and  held  it  true," 
he  certainly  derived  from  it  a  deep  delight  and  sooth- 
ing of  soul.  Yet  the  happy  enlargement  and  splendor 
of  the  Messianic  time  failed  to  appear.  Hezekiah  did 
not  turn  out  to  be  the  Messiah.  Inste^ad  of  enlargement, 
there  came  curtailment  of  territory  (this,  however,  only 
on  the  faith  of  Assyrian  documents).  The  idealistic 
figures  of  Isa.  cli.  IX.  5,  6,  remained  unverified.  They 
may  at  best  be  classed  as  psychical  facts,  present  to  the 
prophet's  ardent  imagination,  while  "rapt  into  future 
times."  Yet  Assur  was  so  much  stronger  than  Isaiah's 
fiction,  and  fiction  will  never  stand  its  ground  when 
fronted  by  and  matched  with  hard  fate. 

A  foretaste  of  Messiahdom,  only,  the  Judeans  had 
during  Hezekiah's  reign,  and  that  in  the  prosperity 
which  prevailed  till  the  calamitous  Assyrian  invasion. 
In  this  respect,  too,  it  is  measurably  true  what  an 
eminent  Eabbi  of  the  fourth  century  C.  E.,  Hillel,  is 
reported  to  have  openly  avowed :  "There  is  no  Messiah 
to  come  more,  as  Israel  enjoyed  him  (his  blessings) 
already  in  the  days  of  Hezekiah"  (Talmud,  treatise 
Synhedrin  f.  98;  compare  ibid.  f.  94,  and  Berachoth  f. 
28).     Yet  it  was  only  a  brief  span  of  Messianic  bliss. 


Presages  of  a  Coming  Golden  Era  of  Peace.     151 

The  following  blight  of  the  Assyrian  invasion  must  have 
taken  away  the  impression  of  gratification  and  delight 
that  happy  condition  had  wrought  upon  the  minds  of  the 
Judeans.  The  nations  did  not,  either,  stream  in  mass  to 
Jerusalem,  his  seat  of  government,  much  less  did  they 
become  subservient  to  his  rule.  Far  from  it.  He 
himself  became  again,  as  the  result  of  Sennacherib's 
invasion,  Assyria's  tributary  and  remained  such  till  the 
end  of  his  life.  jSTor  did  under  him,  or  from  his  time 
on,  the  nations  quit  their  mutual  contests.  Warfare 
with  its  manifold  atrocities,  its  incalculable  destruction 
of  life  and  property,  went  on  in  the  world  as  before. 
The  clash  of  arms  between  impassioned  nations  has  not 
even  been  broug'ht  to  an  end  at  the  present  highly 
enlightened  period  of  the  outgoing  nineteenth  century. 

But,  let  us  say  as  we  close,  would  it  really  have  been 
a  boon  for  Inmi'anity,  if  with  Hezekiah  the  line  of  the 
Jewish  Messiahs  had  been  opened,  to  end  no  more  in  all 
the  succeeding  history  of  the  world  ?  Would  a  onfe-man 
rule  with  his  throne  established  in  Jerusalem  have  been 
a  real  blessing  to  the  human  family?  This,  and  this 
alone,  is  the  important  question.  We  negative  it. 
Frankly  we  declare  that  it  was  so  much  more  desirable, 
even  already  in  the  earlier  civilization  of  Isaiah's  time, 
that  the  Gentile  nations  should  with  the  Judeans  become 
fiiendly  fellow-members  of  the  "Federation  of  the 
world,"  than  feudal  dependents  on  a  would-be  Messianic 
ruler. 

Such  fellow-members  all  humanity  should  indeed  be. 
All  men  should  feel  themselves  bound  together  by  the 
true  sentiment  of  human  brotherhood,  with  law  as  king 


162        The  Christmas  Motto,  and  the  Prophetic 

to  rule  and  direct  life.  Law  as  Messiali  is  good  enough 
for  all  humanity  and  at  all  time:  one  imperative  law, 
organic  for  all  earthly  pilgrims,  who  walk  along  the 
same  high-road  of  life,  share  in  conimon  in  the  struggle 
for  existence,  as  well  as  in  the  end  on  earth,  mortality. 
This  law  is,  the  eternal  principles  and  precepts  of  right- 
eousness and  love.  In  such  combination  as  this,  law 
may  safely  be  trusted  with  imperial  governance,  joined, 
as  it  must  be',  with  the  faith  in  one  God,  as  the  all- 
controlling  supreme  Power.  In  his  service  all  men  sihall 
devotedly  stand,  feeling  themselves  equals  and  one. — in 
the  gTave  sense  of  duty  to  promote  the  best,  blessed  ends 
of  society. 


